The Lady of Shallot

Christopher Nuttall

The Lady of Shallot is free ... but if you want to tip me, check out The Cookie Jar on my site.  I do plan to rewrite this book at some point, so suggestions and suchlike would be very welcome.  

Christopher Nuttall
The Lady of Shalott Blurb

What is a Land without a King?

Ever since the death of King Arthur, Merlin, the first-born son of Satan Himself, has ruled the world.  For a thousand years, science and sorcery have co-existed, creating a world where railways run beside unicorns, while dragons fly through the sky and mermaids swim alongside steamships in the great oceans.  Humanity lives beside the supernatural world, enjoying a peace that has endured ever since the Empire was created.  But now Merlin’s time is running out…

When Merlin departs, anarchy threatens to destroy the Empire.  The Great Lords see a chance to claim supreme power; Commoners fight for the right to be free, while dark sorcerers launch a brutal war to claim the Empire.  

But all of those threats are only the beginning.  Without Merlin, countless natural balances have been overturned.  And the Human Race may be about to pay the price for his crimes…

Prologue

If a man is the sum of his memories, what is a man who is over a thousand years old?

Merlin remembers everything, from the moment when he was ripped screaming from his mother’s womb to the moment his father manifested to him and told him of his destiny, to become the Antichrist.  And he remembers the moment he told his father that he refused to accept his destiny, that he would serve neither Heaven nor Hell.  He walked away, his father’s curses ringing in his ears, and wandered upon the land, with neither a cause or a purpose...until he learned about Arthur, the once and future king.

Arthur had dreamed a dream, a land of peace and harmony, a land that Merlin’s father could never threaten or destroy.  Merlin, already old and ancient, had finally found something he could believe in, and a person he could follow.  He strove to make Arthur’s dream real, providing magic and wisdom to the young man with the very old eyes, using his vast power to safeguard Arthur’s kingdom.  Arthur’s promise could not be lost, or Merlin’s father would have won his final victory.

And yet, Merlin knew that his time on the human plane was coming to an end.  Magic was slipping out of the world, leaving behind science and cool rationality.  Striking a bargain with the Lady of the Lake, one of the oldest and most powerful forces in the Land, Merlin walked willingly into his enchanted tomb, leaving behind a land at peace, ruled by a King who was one with the Land.  He should have slept for the rest of time.

But his father had had a plan of his own.  Arthur had, unknowingly, slept with his own half-sister, the dread Morgan le Fay.  Morgan, a powerful Enchantress with a heritage hidden even from Merlin, conceived a child, Mordred.  With Arthur weakened after the betrayal of Sir Lancelot, Mordred led an army against his father, eventually slaying him on the field of battle.  Arthur’s dream lay in ruins, until Merlin awoke.  With the laughter of his father following his footsteps, Merlin strode out of his sleeping place and destroyed Mordred with his magic.  The war was over, and yet the Land was without a King.

And he remembers how he made a bargain with his father; a thousand years of life, to use as he pleased.  With Arthur and Mordred dead, Merlin declared himself King of the Land.  His magic allowed him to defeat any challenger.  The Pendragon Empire grew until it encompassed the entire world.  Even the Old Gods and the Faerie acknowledged the Devil’s Son.  The Land was at peace.

Back then, Merlin knew, a thousand years had seemed an eternity, even to one who should have known better.  But now his time was running out.  All he had left was the last few years he would have had naturally, and then he would belong to his father.  

And if he died, he asked himself, what would happen to the empire he had built?

Tired and old, weary of the burden he had assumed, drawing on too much magic merely to keep himself alive, Merlin looked into the future and saw only darkness.

Chapter One

“Ho, the Castle!”

Sir Robin of Loxley, Knight of the Round Table, reared in his horse as the drawbridge began to creak down to cross the moat.  It had been a long ride from Mordred – and the great standing stones that an ancient power had raised over the battlefield – and he was tired, too tired to press onwards towards Camelot.  Besides, the Knights of the Round Table had standing orders to call in at the Great Keeps along the way, if only to remind the Lords that Merlin’s servants were keeping an eye on them.  The Duchy of Effrul hadn't seen a Knight for many years.

The drawbridge touched down and Robin spurred his horse onwards, cantering across the bridge.  Effrul Castle was a massive misshapen block of stone, designed to defend against attacks both mundane and magical, yet it couldn't have hoped to stand against Merlin.  Like all of the Knights, Robin could sense magic even if he couldn't wield it for himself and he could feel the wards surrounding the Castle, enough magic to keep out unwanted guests and supernatural vermin.  Inside the walls, there was space for horses and even room for the local villagers, should a foreign army come on them unawares.  That wasn't likely to happen, but the Lords were conservative, often quite alarmingly so.

“Welcome to Effrul,” a voice said.  Robin turned to see a pair of guardsmen, flanking a man wearing the dull grey tunic of a Clark.  The Clark’s voice was low, almost a whisper.  Robin had never met a loud Clark.  “His Grace is currently entertaining in the Great Hall and he would be honoured to see you there.”

“Thank you,” Robin said, as he swung himself off the horse and down to the ground.  His armour, enchanted by the finest alchemists in the land, absorbed the impact with nary a jolt.  He disliked meeting the senior nobility at the best of times, but protocol was protocol; if the Duke wished to meet with him, Robin had little choice.  “Please see to my horse and I will be honoured to wait upon the Duke.”

The interior of Effrul Castle was, if anything, more warded than the exterior.  Robin was uneasily aware of powerful spells crawling through the stone walls, watching for any sign of a threat.  There were few luxuries on display, a reminder that Duke Rufus Valditch, Duke of Effrul, had no need to show off his wealth and power.  Hundreds of servants moved through the stone corridors, carrying out the orders of their lord and master.  A number of them wore glowing gems that marked them out as being enchanted for loyalty and unquestioning devotion.  Robin felt a shiver running down his spine as he met the eyes of one of the spell-controlled servants.  They had always made him feel uneasy, a reminder that even the strongest and most valiant warrior was often helpless against magic.  Even the protections built into his armour wouldn't last forever.

They paused in front of a gold-edged mirror, a none-too-subtle suggestion that he should see to his appearance.  Robin’s white-gold armour was stained with the signs of a long trip and his hair was a mess, no longer tied back inside his helmet.  Tiredly, he ran his hands through his dark hair and murmured a charm to his armour.  It seemed to shimmer around him, and then it was as clean and bright as the day it had been presented to him and bonded to his very soul.  It was almost a second skin.  He touched the tip of his sword, hanging in the scabbard, before turning back to the Clark.  The drab man showed no sign of approval or disapproval; he just walked forward, threw open a large stone door, and announced Robin’s arrival to the court.

Robin wasn't unduly surprised, as he walked into the massive chamber, to see hundreds of men and women glancing at him, a handful turning quickly to conceal signs of guilt or wrongdoing.  Many of them had good reasons to fear the Knights of the Round Table, Merlin’s personal enforcers and investigators, even if they were connected to the highest aristocrats in the land.  Merlin had appointed their ancestors to the nobility, binding them to the Pendragon Empire, but nobility was no shield when certain crimes were involved.  They might well wonder if Merlin had sent him to Duke Valditch with a ulterior motive.

He kept his eyes level, studying the crowd as the Clark led him forwards, towards the High Table. Many were noblemen of lesser ranks – the Dukes were the highest nobility in the Empire, second only to Merlin himself – who would count Duke Valditch as their patron.  He would grant them his help and support in exchange for their absolute loyalty, in and out of the House of Lords. A handful would even have been raised to Knighthood by the Duke personally, the ultimate reward.  Robin concealed a smile with the ease of long practice; in his experience, Knights who hadn’t been through the heaviest training program in the Empire were often worthless on the field of battle.  They were more concerned with winning their place in High Society, rather than defending the population.  That, as had been hammered into him from the day he’d reported for training, was the ultimate purpose of a Knight.  Very few Knights of the Round Table lived long enough to collect their reward and honourable discharge.  Even so, there was no shortage of volunteers.

A second group was composed of magicians.  There were wizards, wearing the white robes of fully-trained magicians, each one wearing a golden badge that signified his College. Robin wasn't surprised to see that most of them had been trained in the nearest College, one largely under the Duke’s thumb.  Only a handful had been trained outside the Dukedom.  A second group of magicians wore no robes, indicating that they had little formal training.  Robin watched them warily.  In his experience, a magician who hadn’t been trained formally could be a more dangerous foe than one who had been through a College.  It was often hard to predict what an untrained magician would do, or would be capable of doing, given half the chance.

There were no sorcerers, he noted, with a brief flicker of relief.  Sorcerers, the most powerful and dangerous magicians in the Empire, tended to be unpredictable.  They rarely found employment from the nobility, even though a sane sorcerer was often capable of defeating any number of wizards.  They were just too unpredictable and dangerous, teetering permanently on the edge of madness.

A third group of guests proved to be composed of merchants, wearing the flashy outfits that signified that they’d made or inherited enough money that even the aristocrats had to take them seriously.  Robin suspected that most of them only wore the outrageous outfits because they wanted to show that they’d arrived – which suggested a certain basic insecurity – but it wasn't something he held against them.  Few nobles took commoners seriously, no matter how much money the commoner had earned in his life; High Society rarely sullied its hands making money.  It just wasn’t done.  Robin kept his face expressionless as two of the merchants – doubtless thinking that they were moving stealthily – tried to move away from him.  They were probably wondering if he knew about some of the more…questionable deals they’d made in the past.  Their very presence in the Dukedom suggested ties to the Duke.

The crowd parted around him as he finally reached the High Table.  It was a raised dais, crafted out of marble and decorated by gold leaf, a symbol of power and might.  The Duke himself sat on an iron throne – a near-copy of Merlin’s throne, in the Iron Palace of Camelot – watching as his guests comported themselves below him.  He wouldn't be so gauche as to discuss business matters in public, not when he was holding a fancy ball.  The important people – at least to the Duke – would meet with him later, while the other guests were sleeping off heavy doses of food and alcohol in their bedchambers.

Duke Rufus Valditch was tall and thin, wearing a long tunic that was just one shade lighter than sorcerer’s black.  He had long white hair, tied back in a ponytail that seemed to move with a life of its own, and a pinched face that seemed to have forgotten how to smile.  His cold grey eyes met Robin’s blue eyes and refused to quail.  The chances were that he had some magical talent of his own – magic was strong in the aristocratic bloodlines – but he wore nothing to signal his powers.  He would prefer, Robin suspected, to keep his enemies guessing.  The wards his pet magicians had crafted to protect him would block any magician from studying his magical field, except – perhaps – Merlin himself.  Robin had heard, when he’d been trained in less violent methods of fighting, that the Duke preferred to remain away from Camelot, so secure was he in his power and position.  Or perhaps he just didn’t like the reminder that there was someone more powerful than himself.  The castle might be crawling with defensive wards, designed to keep out unwanted guests, but they wouldn’t stand for long against Merlin. Merlin had destroyed entire counties in his time.

Robin bowed, knowing that it would irritate most of the aristocrats in the room.  He came from commoner stock, plucked out of a village several hundred miles to the north and sent to study at the Garrison, and his nobility came from his Knighthood.  He wasn't, and would never be, their social equal, but they’d never be able to put him in his place.  An insult to a Knight of the Round Table was an insult to Merlin himself – and no one crossed the Emperor Merlin without making out their will first.

“Welcome to my Court,” Duke Valditch said.  His voice was cold and precise, suggesting that he’d been using magical treatments to stretch out his life.  “We are honoured by the presence of a Knight of the Round Table.”

“Thank you, Your Grace,” Robin said.  “I am honoured to attend your Court.”

The Duke seemed unimpressed.  Robin was suddenly aware that every eye was fixed on them, every ear straining to catch their every word.  What happened between one of Merlin’s Knights and the Duke might determine their futures.  He could almost hear minds calculating away behind inscrutable features.  If Duke Valditch was about to take a fall, his friends and clients would have a chance to improve their own positions at the expense of their former master – if they switched sides in time.  Even the musicians had stopped playing.

“Please, honour us with your presence and news from Camelot,” the Duke said.  “We have not seen a Knight of the Round Table in my lands for a very long time.”

Too long, Robin thought, coldly.  Something was definitely wrong.  Just for a moment, he wished that Tiffany was with him.  She would not only have been able to read the crowd, but to know what they were trying to conceal.  But Tiffany was back at Camelot, serving the Emperor and awaiting their marriage.  The thought of her reminded him just how much he missed Tiffany.  Her acceptance of his proposal had been a dream come true.

“Certainly, Your Grace,” Robin said, resigning himself to a few hours of boredom.  The guests would expect him to mingle, to play the socialite and tell them his news – all the while analysing his words in the hope that they might allow them to understand his true purpose for visiting the Duke.  He smiled inwardly, knowing that none of them would believe the truth.  He’d come merely for a rest before he resumed his ride back towards Camelot – and Tiffany.  “I thank you for your hospitality.”

The Duke nodded, dismissing him – and the chamber began to hum with conversation, the tension slowly fading out of the air.  Robin was aware of covert glances following him as he stepped back and started to mingle, but he ignored them, at least openly.  It dawned on him that the evening could be fun, in a way.  A handful of carefully-dropped remarks might frighten the guiltier among the guests into revealing themselves, or doing something careless.  He accepted a drink from a serving maid and started to plan his campaign.

“Commoner,” a voice snapped.  A hand fell on his shoulder, from behind.  Robin spun around, one hand dropping to the hilt of his sword.  The voice had sounded angry.  “How dare you come to my castle?”

Robin saw a young man, wearing golden armour so brightly polished that Robin could see his own face reflected back in it.  The young man had long blonde hair and a handsome face, although it was contorted by an unpleasant sneer.  His voice was that of a person unused to not getting his way, in everything.  Robin didn’t need to study the chin to know that he was looking at the Duke’s son and Heir, Lord Lucas.  He had the air of entitlement that every young aristocrat seemed to share, apart from Tiffany.  But then, Tiffany had had to grow up in a hurry after her father had died.  This young man had never had to learn how the world actually worked, or the limits of aristocratic power.  The mere fact that his hand was on the hilt of his sword – as if he was going to draw on a Knight of the Round Table – proved his ignorance.

“I came because I needed to rest,” Robin said, as patiently as he could.  He took his hand away from his own sword, confident that he could draw it if Lucas actually produced his own sword.  The young man would have been trained in swordplay – every young male aristocrat was, if only because they might be challenged to a duel by their social equals – but he wouldn't have much real experience.  No one would risk challenging a Duke’s Heir, while Robin had had to fight for his life since he’d grown into maturity.

“And you took her from me, commoner,” Lucas thundered, angrily.  He hadn’t taken his hand from his sword, even though he’d made no move to draw it.  Robin realised, suddenly, that Lucas was drunk.  “How dare you pollute our blood with your filthy mongrel ways?”

Robin winced inwardly as he realised – too late – what was actually going on.  Tiffany was the Lady of Shalott, the mistress of a realm that might not have been a Dukedom, but was ruled by one of the oldest bloodlines in the land.  She’d have been a prize catch for anyone, even the Heir of a Dukedom, yet her position at Camelot would have intimidated many potential suitors, or their parents.  Lucas had to have been one of the few to try to court her – and, judging from his reaction to her successful suitor, she’d rejected him emphatically.  No male would take that very calmly, particularly not one with such a spectacular sense of entitlement.

“Enough,” he said, quietly.

“Yes, enough,” Lucas shouted.  He started to draw his sword.  “I should whip you and…”

A hand caught Lucas’s wrist before he could pull the sword from its scabbard.  “More than enough,” Duke Valditch said, firmly.  Lucas purpled, but he had enough sense not to challenge his father publicly.  He might have been the Duke’s only male son, yet there was precedent for passing a noble estate to a female if the male heirs were disinherited.  “I apologise for my son’s outburst, Sir Robin, and I will see that the matter ends here.”

“Thank you, Your Grace,” Robin said, quietly relieved.  Killing the Duke’s Heir would have had consequences – and if by some dark miracle Lucas had managed to kill him…he would have embroiled his family against Merlin, the near-omnipotent ruler of the empire.  Merlin would not have been inclined to let such an insult pass unpunished.  “I have taken no offence.”

“But there is a matter that requires the attention of a Knight,” Duke Valditch continued, almost meditatively.  “Last week, an entire village was depopulated, the population stolen away by an unknown power.  Your assistance in solving this mystery would be appreciated.”

Robin’s eyes narrowed.  It was fairly common for ambitious or restless peasants to flee aristocratic lands and escape to the free cities – or to hide in the countryside and turn bandit – but an entire village disappearing was something rare, even close to the Greenwood.  The Duke was Master of High, Middle and Low Justice in his Duchy – and besides, if he’d been mistreating his peasants, he wouldn't want a Knight of the Round Table investigating.  And that raised the question of why the Duke wanted him involved.  Did he think that Robin had been sent to investigate the disappearance, or was he trying to divert Robin from something else, something more incriminating?  With Duke Blackrock locked up in the Tower of Camelot, perhaps the Duke was feeling a little concerned about his future.

“Lucas will show you the village tomorrow,” the Duke continued, taking Robin’s silence for assent.  Robin knew that there was no real choice.  If the village was close to the Greenwood – and the Duchy itself was far too close to Mordred – it was quite possible that the village population had been stolen away into Faerie.  And that was an act of war.

Lucas looked as if he would like to object, but a sharp glance from his father froze his tongue before he could speak.  Robin kept his own face expressionless.  There was little to be gained from humiliating the younger man, even if he needed a sound thrashing.  Duke Valditch might be cold and calculating, but at least he accepted his responsibilities.  His son seemed utterly fixed on his entitlements and ignorant of the responsibilities that came with his title.  If he hadn’t learned by the time his father died, the Duchy was in for hard times.

“Of course, Your Grace,” Robin said.  He would have preferred to go alone, but the Duke seemed unwillingly to offer him the choice.  Besides, perhaps Lucas would be better company once he was sober.  “I will find out what happened and report to higher authority.”

The Duke looked unmoved, but his son seemed alarmed.  There was only one higher authority in the land, Merlin himself.

And if Merlin took an interest in the Duchy, there was no way they could hide anything from the Devil’s only son.

Chapter Two

Lucas was still fuming the following morning, when they rode away from the castle.  How dare the Knight of the Round Table – the jumped-up commoner – treat him as if he was of no account?  He was Lucas, Heir to the most powerful Duchy in England, with a bloodline that stretched all the way back to the time of Arthur.  And to think that the commoner would be marrying one of the most eligible woman in the land!  It was intolerable!

His father had made his position clear, however.  They’d spoken – his father had talked at him, rather – the night after the gathering.  “You are the Heir to my Duchy,” his father had said, in the cold dry voice that was somehow worse than shouting, or a beating.  “You need to learn control and restraint.  We depend upon Merlin for our power – even our lives – and the price for Merlin’s support is our...tolerance for Merlin’s messenger, whoever he happens to be!”

“But father,” Lucas had protested, “he’s a commoner, bedding a noblewoman...”

“You failed to convince Lady Tiffany to wed you,” his father had said, with deadly calm.  Lucas still recalled the discussion they’d had after Lady Tiffany had rejected his suit.  His father had had ambitions to unite Effrul with Shalott, something that would have given him an unmatched position in the House of Lords.  “He convinced her to accept his suit.  You will accept that, at least publically.  Do you understand me?”

“Yes, father,” Lucas had said, reluctantly.  “But...”

“You will be polite and aid Sir Robin in his quest to find out what happened to the villagers,” his father had ordered.  “You will do nothing that might imperil our position here.  Do you understand me?”

The memories burned through his head as he led Sir Robin along a forest path used only by the nobles and poachers.  Long ago, Lucas had learned to ride in the duchy, but now he rarely had time just to put everything aside and spend time on horseback.  These days, he worked for his father, even though his father seemed reluctant to share anything with his son and heir.  There were times when Lucas considered assassinating – murdering – his father, but he knew that he didn't have the nerve.  His father had terrified him from the day he’d been presented at Camelot as the Duke’s Heir.  Lucas couldn't even bring himself to shout back at his father.

Sir Robin didn't seem inclined to talk, even though his father had hoped that they’d find a way to become friends and even allies.  It wasn't going to happen, Lucas knew, not when bitter jealousy and rage burned through Lucas’s mind.  The commoner had the woman Lucas had wanted – and he had everything that Lucas had wanted.  His father had refused to allow him to try out for Knighthood, or even to raise him to Knighthood personally.  Sir Robin, commoner and servant of the Enchanter King, had a freedom and confidence Lucas lacked, and feared that he would never have.  They spent the long ride in silence.

The village itself was nearly an hour away from the castle, even on horseback.  Lucas had visited it once as a younger child, back when he’d accompanied his father on one of his yearly tours of his domains.  His memories of the village were hazy; like all commoner settlements, it was drab, dirty and populated by people who were loyal to their superiors, if only because they knew that a show of disloyalty would mean immediate execution.  Lucas’s father’s justice was harsh, cold and utterly without scruple.  The peasants knew that any rebellion against their Duke would be crushed, swiftly and mercilessly.  He smiled as a memory flickered through his mind.  The village’s headman – a man called Igor -  had known just to scrape and bow in front of his superiors.

He reared in his horse as the forest path widened, allowing them to canter down towards the village.  It wasn't an impressive sight, even though it was close enough to the Greenwood to make even Lucas uncomfortable.  A handful of stone houses – barely more than hovels – a stone church and a couple of other buildings, surrounded by a handful of fields.  The peasants would eke out an existence from the fields, passing on most of their crops and livestock to their masters, living on what little they were allowed to keep.  Lucas had never questioned how they lived.  As his father had once told him, in a rare genial mood, peasants existed to serve their superiors and they should be happy with their lot.  If they weren't, there was always the hangman’s rope and dark magic to keep them in line.

But the village was completely deserted.  Lucas might not have been allowed to fight, but he had hunted ever since he’d grown into his teens and he had a hunter’s instincts.  There was no one in the village, or in the scraggly fields where the men should have been slaving away, while their womenfolk cooked, cleaned and made babies.  Even the church, the strongest building in the village, had been abandoned.  The priest, chosen by his father from a list submitted by Rome, was gone.  The entire village was deserted.  

Lucas watched as Sir Robin slipped off his horse and started to walk towards the village, leaving his horse waiting behind, watching with unnervingly intelligent eyes.  The Knight seemed surrounded by a brilliant white light as the sunlight reflected off his armour, even though Lucas was sure that that would make him a target for anyone with bad intentions.  He slipped off his own horse – a far less obedient animal, even though Lucas loved his stallion – and drew his sword.  There was no visible threat, but he had the uneasy sense that something was watching him.  Something that might not be human...

He looked up the forest, towards the boundary line and the Greenwood, and shivered.  Every instinct he had was telling him to run, to leave the village to the wind and the rain, but he couldn't leave.  His father had ordered him to stay, to keep an eye on the Knight, and he couldn't fail his father.  He wanted to call out to Sir Robin, to tell him to leave the dirty smelly commoners to their fate, but he didn't quite dare.

Silently, lost in his own thoughts and fears, Lucas watched as Robin began to search the village.

***
Robin was aware of Lucas’s gaze boring into his back, but he ignored it.  A Knight of the Round Table developed instincts very young – or he didn't survive his training, let alone his first year of service – and something was clearly very wrong.  Robin had grown up in a small community, not too different from the unnamed village, and it should have been bustling with life.  The farmers should have been in the fields, their wives and daughters should have been cooking and the children should have already been learning the tasks that they’d perform as they grew into adulthood.  He missed very little about his former life, but one attitude he’d never been allowed to shun was that commoners were people too.  The Knights of the Round Table existed to defend everyone, from the highest in the land to the lowest beggar in the streets of the free cities.

He glanced into the first house and scowled.  There was no sign of a struggle; it looked as if the population had just walked away one day and never looked back.  He looked up at the stone slab above the door and frowned as he saw the horseshoe hanging there, a charm that should have kept most supernatural vermin from entering the house.  Robin had hardly any magical talent of his own, but he whispered a handful of words in the magical tongue, words that should have caused a bright flash of light.  Nothing happened, proving that the horseshoe charm maintained its power, keeping the wild magic under restraint.  A magician could have overcome its limited protections, but a supernatural force should have been unable to enter.

Shaking his head, he walked back outside, into the bright sunlight, and glanced over at Lucas.  The Duke’s son was waiting on the outskirts of the tiny village, as if he was unable to cross the invisible line that separated the village from the fields outside.  His bearing suggested that he would sooner be somewhere – anywhere – else, as if what had happened to the villagers hardly mattered.  It probably didn't to him, Robin thought coldly; like all aristocrats, Lucas cared little for his social inferiors.  Robin, who had been born a commoner, cared more about the poor than he did the wealthy and powerful.  The latter could, in his experience, take care of themselves.

Ignoring Lucas’s constant gaze, he strode over to the church, recalling the smiling warmly dressed priest who’d greeted them every Sunday when the family had gone to church.  Robin, as the youngest child, had carried the small bronze coin destined for the priest, even though it had taken his father and brothers a day’s hard labour to earn the coin.  It had never seemed fair to him that the family had to give up so much of their wealth to a man who seemed to lack for nothing, but his father had whipped him when he’d raised the question.  It had taken him years to understand that his father had been ashamed of his own weakness, his failure to break free of the church’s demands.  Those who shunned the church were shunned by their community.

The church was fairly typical for a small village.  There were wooden pews for the villagers – he recalled that they’d been hard on the bottom after a long and vigorous sermon – and a golden stand, draped with purple cloth, for the priest.  A golden cross hung behind the stand, showing the moment when Jesus, the Son of God, had been crucified by the Romans.  Robin stepped inside, but saw no one.  The church had been completely abandoned.  Even the feeling of stepping inside a holy place was absent.  And that suggested dark magic.

He walked back outside and started to study the village, looking for clues.  Tracking wasn’t a hard skill to master – Robin had learned by poaching from the local forest as a growing man – and it was clear that the villagers had done nothing to hide their departure.  They’d simply come out of their houses and walked up, towards the boundary line and the Greenwood.  And they’d never been seen again.  

No wonder the Duke was worried, Robin thought, grimly.  The Greenwood was one place where the Duke’s writ didn’t run.  It was home to supernatural creatures, ones who lived according to their own rules – and cared nothing for humanity.  Centuries ago, humanity had cowered in their hovels at night when the old creatures walked upon the land, knowing that anyone walking out after darkness was unlikely to be seen again.  They had hidden themselves from the eyes of creatures more powerful than humanity, demanding respect from those they saw as inferiors.  Those who spoke ill of the Fair Folk had often never spoken again.

It had been Merlin who had established the boundary lines, preventing the supernatural creatures from entering human lands.  Even the Old Gods had been unable to face Merlin and they’d reluctantly agreed to respect the boundary lines, but anyone could cross them and enter the Greenwood – and they might never be seen again.  Robin had walked into the Greenwood as a very young man – when he’d been desperately trying to escape a team of guardsmen intent on beating the poacher to death – and knew that he’d been lucky to escape.  If the villagers had crossed the boundary line en masse, for whatever reason, they would never be seen again.

And yet...why had they crossed the boundary line?

Robin knew that he could just walk away and report back to Camelot, but that wasn't his style.  He couldn't abandon the villagers, not while there was the merest chance they might still be alive – and capable of returning to human society.  His hand touched the sigils engraved on his armour, sigils that represented Merlin himself.  He could walk into the Greenwood and rely on their protection to gain an audience with the creatures that had stolen the villagers.  Perhaps he could even convince them to allow the villagers to return, unharmed.  It had to be tried.

He walked back up to where Lucas was waiting, trying not to show his fear and apprehension.  Robin had been reading people ever since he’d started his long apprenticeship and Lucas, although he was trying to hide it, was an open book.  The village was bothering him and all he wanted to do was get back to his castle and hide behind the battlements.  Robin carefully refrained from showing his amusement openly.  Perhaps the experience of confronting something far more powerful than himself would do Lucas good.

“They went into the Greenwood,” he confirmed, briefly.  A handful of peasants might run off to the free cities, or become bandits, but an entire village...?  No, it wouldn't happen.  “I’m going in after them.”

He watched a complex series of emotions washing over Lucas’s face.  Cruel amusement; Robin might well not come out of the Greenwood, leaving Lucas to renew his suit for Tiffany’s hand.  Fear; Robin might expect him to come with him into the Greenwood – and his father would be angry if he refused to follow the Knight, even into certain death.  Terror; he didn’t dare walk forwards or go back with his tail between his legs.

“You’re going to stay here,” Robin said, firmly.  He’d never met a Faerie – or one of the lesser supernatural creatures – in his life, but he knew the basic rules for approaching them.  They demanded respect from humanity – and Lucas, with his inflated sense of entitlement, would show them none.  Bringing him along could jeopardize everything.  “If I don’t come back out by sunset, go back to the castle and report to my superiors.”

“Yes,” Lucas managed.  He didn't look any happier at the thought of remaining in the village until nightfall, but Robin was sure that he’d remain behind, if only because he was afraid of his father.  Robin had no idea what they’d said to each other, after the gathering had come to an end, yet it had clearly forced Lucas into at least making an attempt to be civil.  “I’ll remain here...”

Robin nodded, patted his horse on the forehead, and turned to walk towards the Greenwood.  Even behind the boundary line, he could feel the wild magic crackling through the air, luring him onwards.  Anyone with even the slightest touch of magic would be able to feel it; indeed, Robin knew that some magicians walked into the Greenwood in hopes of finding a magical hotspot they could use to power themselves.  Only a very few returned alive, and most of them were monsters.  It wasn't a reassuring thought.

The vegetation began to change as he approached the boundary line.  He’d been told once that wild magic – uncontrolled by humanity – had an effect on anyone and anything unlucky enough to be touched by it.  Plants and animals seemed to be warped by exposure to wild magic, creating new strains of wildlife, some of which were very dangerous.  Back where he’d been born, a new species of toad had somehow developed the ability to mesmerise their prey – and humans.  He still recalled rescuing a small girl who had been on the verge of drowning herself, influenced by a creature that couldn't form a coherent thought.  And that was one of the more harmless creatures.

He paused outside the boundary line, feeling its invisible presence in the air, and stepped forward.  The sensation of wild magic hit him instantly.  Blue energy crackled through the air, flickering and flaring in and out of existence.  Strange creatures seemed to appear at the edge of his vision, somehow never there when he looked at them directly.  Robin knew himself to be brave – he’d proven it to himself hundreds of times over the last ten years – yet it was all he could do not to turn and flee for his life.  He forced himself to think of the villagers and pressed onwards.  Besides, a show of weakness in the Greenwood might prove fatal.

The temperature kept rising as he pressed onwards, grimly aware of unseen eyes watching his every move.  He heard sounds in the distance that had come from no human throat, strange calls that attracted and repelled him in equal measure.  Just for a long moment, the entire forest shook as an impossibly huge creature seemed to be stamping its way towards him.  The vegetation pressed in around the path, cutting off his view.  Anything could be coming towards him – or shadowing his lonely walk – and he wouldn’t know about it until it was right on top of him.  The sensation of threat just kept growing stronger...he reached out with his senses, only to be nearly deafened by a cacophony of sound, so loud and powerful that he had to cover his ears...

...There was something shadowing him, right behind him.  Robin reached down and took a firm grip on his sword, trying to draw what reassurance he could from its solid metalwork.  It might not be any use against a supernatural creature, whatever charms the enchanters had worked into the metal.  Some of the supernatural creatures could only be killed by cold iron – and he had none.  He tensed as he heard deep heavy breathing, coming from a throat that was very definitely not human.   Light footsteps – the kind made by someone who wanted to remain silent – echoed behind him.  He had to turn...

“Please,” a voice said.  It was low and gravelly.  “Please don’t turn around.”

Robin half-drew his sword.  “I mean you no harm,” it said.  Robin’s instincts told him, oddly, that the creature was telling the truth.  “I just don’t want to be seen.  I was human once.  And now I am a monster.”

Chapter Three

Robin hesitated, unsure of how to act.

“You were human once?”  He asked, finally.  The creature was right behind him.  He could feel warm breath on the back of his neck.  “Who are you?”

“I have forgotten my name,” the voice said.  There was a long pause.  Human or not, few creatures made a gift of their name to anyone.  A dark magician could use that knowledge to craft spells against them.  “Call me Thorn, if you wish.”

Robin nodded, absently.  He still held his sword, but his instincts told him that Thorn wasn't a real threat.  Or maybe the wild magic flickering through the Greenwood was deluding him.  Wild magic did strange and unpredictable things to unwary intruders.  It had certainly done something to Thorn.

“They hounded me from the village,” Thorn said, from behind him.  His voice was growing more human as he spoke, as if he hadn’t talked to another human for a very long time and was out of practice.  “I was small and smelly and even my own parents couldn’t look upon me without revulsion.  There was not a woman my own age who did not mock me for an ugly gnome.  There was not a boy who didn’t seek to make me the butt of his cruel jokes, or to beat me for being what I am.  They drove me from the village when their crops began to fail, claiming that I was a changeling from the fairies.  I ran into the Greenwood and never returned.”

It was a familiar story, Robin knew.  There were nobles who talked about peasants having a kind of nobility, as if being born into squalor conferred a dignity that was unmatched by those born to the aristocracy.  Robin, child of peasants, knew better.  A peasant’s life was nasty, brutish and short, even in England.  The lucky ones might escape to one of the free cities, or enlist into their master’s personal guard, but they were only a handful.  The remainder had little choice.  They remained in squalor.

And it brought out the worst in them.  The stronger peasants, helpless before their lords and masters, took it out on the weaker peasants.  They beat their wives, thrashed their children and picked on those who were even slightly different, as if it somehow alleviated their own suffering, or gave it meaning.  Thorn might have always been touched by magic – he’d been luckier than many who were exposed to wild magic – but that hadn’t protected him from his fellow villagers.  They’d taken out their shame and humiliation on him.  Robin felt a flicker of sympathy.  Whatever Thorn was now, it didn’t excuse how his fellows had treated him as a child.

“The village has been abandoned,” Robin said.  He could feel Thorn’s presence behind him, trusting that he’d have enough warning to defend himself if the once-human creature lunged forward, bent on killing him.  Wild magic brought instability – even insanity – along with its other unwanted gifts.  “Did you lure them away and kill them?”

Thorn laughed, harshly.  There was a hint of madness in the laugh.  “I could not cross the boundary line,” he said.  Robin frowned, uncertain if he believed the former human.  The boundary lines weren’t perfect; some magician creatures, the ones closest to humanity, could cross them at will.  Thorn, touched by wild magic, might still have been able to return home.  Or perhaps he had seen himself reflected in water and known that to return would mean death, hunted by Lucas and his cronies as a monster.  Ridding their lands of monsters was one of the duties assigned to the aristocracy.  “But I saw what happened to them.”

Robin stepped forward, away from Thorn.  “What happened to them?”

“They came in the night,” Thorn said.  Robin could hear cold pleasure in his voice, as if he delighted in the fall of his former tormentors.  Or perhaps Thorn’s tormentors were long gone while he’d been lurking in the Greenwood, where time was often fluid and unstable.  There was no way to know.  Thorn certainly wouldn't be able to answer him, if he asked.  “They raided the village and took them all out of their hovels, dragging them into the darkness.  There was no escape.  Those who resisted died.”

Robin frowned.  “Who came?”

Thorn ignored the question.  “They were marched up into the Greenwood,” he continued, telling his story with an eerie delight.  Robin had been taught that it was ungallant to sneer at the defeat of a former enemy, but his life – as hard as it had been – hadn’t been anything like as hard as Thorn’s, even before the wild magic had turned him into a monster.  “They were enchanted, forced to walk down to the lake.  And there they were killed in a moment, screaming out into the night as they died.  And I laughed to see them brought so low.”

His voice grew darker.  “I saw them die, begging for a mercy that would never come,” Thorn added.  “I laughed.  Why should I not laugh?  Was there a one of them who showed me mercy and friendship and kindness and compassion?  Was there a one of them who deserved a second chance at life?  Where was their laughter as they died? You can laugh, for by the words, I surely shall.”

Robin heard a low rustling behind him as Thorn moved closer.  “You could have helped them....”

“Why should I have helped them?”  Thorn asked.  He laughed again, the sound driving away the ever-present sounds of the Greenwood.  Wild magic seemed to flicker through his words.  “Where was their help when I needed it?”

Robin pushed the issue aside.  “Who came for them?”  He repeated.  “Who could kidnap and slaughter an entire village?”

He didn’t expect an answer and so he was surprised when Thorn told him.  “The Dark Sorcerers,” he said.  Robin felt a flash of alarm as he gripped his sword tighter, braced for an attack that might never come.  “They came and took and killed and…”

Thorn’s voice broke down into another unsteady laugh.  Dark Sorcerers!  Robin had half-expected that answer, yet Dark Sorcerers rarely showed themselves so close to Camelot.   Their very existence was a crime against nature and Merlin, all-too-aware of the terrible price in blood and suffering Dark Sorcerers paid for their powers, had decreed their extermination.  And they’d held a ritual here, so close to Camelot!  No wonder they’d used the Greenwood for their Black Mass.  A ritual held outside such an omnipresent field of wild magic would be detected instantly, even from half the world away.  There were dangers in trying to carry out any rituals so close to a source of wild magic, but Dark Sorcerers were already insane.  They would do anything to increase their powers, whatever the risks.

“Walk down towards the lake,” Thorn ordered, his voice suddenly clearing.  “You’ll see their last resting place, if you hurry.  The Greenwood is taking them for itself.”

Robin let go of his sword hilt and followed the path down a sloping hill.  The foliage cleared suddenly, revealing a clear blue lake at the bottom of a hollow, surrounded by trees and strange plants, warped and twisted by the wild magic.  The water was surrounded by an alluring shimmer and Robin shivered, resolving to stay well away from the lake.  No one knew why, but large bodies of water were somehow connected to the Enchanted Land of Avalon, where the Faerie and the other supernatural creatures lived.  They’d retreated back to their own lands when Merlin had created the boundary lines, too scared of Merlin to refuse his command, and were rarely seen in the human world.  Robin suspected, from encountering a handful of supernatural creatures in his time, that their hatred for humanity and the half-human who ruled the world had never faded.  In Avalon, where time was fluid and years could pass in an instant, they could wait for the world to change again, to welcome them home.

But Merlin was immortal.  They’d never be allowed to return to the land.

The sense of dark magic struck him the moment he stepped into the clearing.  Dark magic, magic worked with ill intentions, was easy to sense, even with his limited perceptions.  He had to swallow hard to prevent himself from vomiting, or collapsing onto the path – or even out of it.  Walking on the path provided limited protection; walking off the path would expose him to uncontrolled wild magic.  The Dark Sorcerers had performed the blackest of black magic rituals in the Greenwood, slaughtering the innocent villagers to power their spells.  Even for black magicians, the act was extreme, with only one possible objective.  They’d raised other rogue magicians into sorcery.  An entire cabal of Dark Sorcerers existed, right under Merlin’s nose.

Robin gritted his teeth as he moved closer, keeping a wary distance from the lake and its enchanting shimmer.  Or maybe the Dark Sorcerers were based elsewhere, using the duchy as a decoy.  Sorcerers could teleport, allowing them to jump across the entire world in an instant.  They could be based anywhere.  They’d probably teleported out as soon as they had completed their ritual, knowing that detection would mean that the Knights of the Round Table would be dispatched to investigate.  Or perhaps the more shadowy – and feared – Tribunal, charged with hunting down black magicians, would become involved.

The bodies on the ground were almost decayed down to nothing, he saw.  The Greenwood’s unique ecology would already be absorbing them, drawing them into a world warped by wild magic.  Who knew what would happen to the bodies?  The souls, at least, would be long gone.  They wouldn't be trapped in the Greenwood, unlike others.  Robin had seen ghosts wandering through ancient abandoned castles and towns, calling for release that could never come.  He knew that he should have the bodies buried properly, but he didn’t dare try to pull the remains away from the Greenwood.  They belonged to the wild magic now.

“And so they died,” Thorn said.  The monster had remained in the foliage, unwilling to come out into the sunlight and expose himself to Robin’s stare.  His deep breathing was loud enough for Robin to hear, even in the enchanted clearing.  “The Dark Sorcerers destroyed their lives and left their remains here, to become part of the Greenwood.  And so life goes on.”

“True,” Robin agreed.  Dark Sorcerers!  An entire cabal of Dark Sorcerers!  Camelot had to be warned – which, at least, would provide an excuse to abandon the rest of his patrol and return to Camelot, and Tiffany.  The sooner they started searching for the Dark Sorcerers, the better.  “I’m sorry for what happened to you.”

Thorn laughed, harshly.  “I am content,” he said, flatly.  “I am part of the Greenwood now, part of a community that human eyes never see, where I have found an acceptance denied to me my humanity.  Even my parents rejected me, but now my parents are dead!”

Robin said nothing.  The village had been protected by charms, but they’d only been effective against supernatural vermin.  There would have been little stopping the Dark Sorcerers from entering the village, killing a handful of the strongest to establish their control and then marching the peasants up to the place of slaughter.  Or perhaps they’d just used their powers, spelled the villagers into helpless obedience and ordered them to march placidly to their deaths.  Dark Sorcerers refused to acknowledge the Wizardly Strictures that governed how magicians could use their powers, laws placed into effect by Merlin himself.  It granted them vast powers and freedom of action, but the cost of sorcery was high.  Dark Sorcerers were often completely insane…and very, very dangerous.  One of them was a nightmare in human form.  An entire group was a hellish threat for almost any place in the land.  Camelot had to be warned.

“I hear whispers,” Thorn said, as Robin turned to go.  He could walk back to Lucas, send him back to his father with a warning, and then gallop off to the main road back to Camelot.  He’d reach the railway station outside the duchy by the end of the day, which would speed him to Camelot by the following morning.  “There are whispers running through Avalon and down into the Greenwood.  The whispers say that a time of change is coming, that the whole order of life is soon to be reversed.  And then we will walk free upon the land.”

Robin felt a shiver running down his spine.  Avalon was fluid, nothing like the fixed land Merlin ruled.  It was possible for someone living in Avalon, or near one of the soft places that allowed transit between Earth and Avalon, to see hints and glimpses of the future.  Oracles never saw the entire truth, and often they misinterpreted what they saw, but their prophecies could be alarmingly accurate.  And Thorn, a being with ties to the wild magic, might well see more than a human oracle.

“They’re waiting on the other side of the land,” Thorn added.  He sounded…unconcerned by his words, even as their full import landed on Robin’s shoulders.  “They’re biding their time, waiting for everything to change, storing their malice in their black hearts.  The time is coming when they will be able to return to your world and take their place as the lords and masters of all.  And humanity will learn, once again, to fear the night.”

Robin turned, walking back towards the path.  Something was moving in the foliage, trying to escape his gaze.  Just for a second, Robin saw a hulking misshapen form, crouching low to avoid being seen.  At full height, he realised, Thorn would be almost the size of a gorilla, or one of the great apes that lived in the rainforests on the lower continent.  He might have been human once, but now he was something far more dangerous, a creature of wild magic.  His skin seemed to shimmer with lizard-like scales; his eyes, meeting Robin’s for a fraction of a second, were bright red orbs in the semi-darkness.  No wonder, Robin thought with a hint of pity, that Thorn had never tried to return to the village, or even find a place among humanity.  He’d never be accepted, ever.  Robin knew of others touched by wild magic while growing in their mother’s womb, warped and twisted before they’d even had a chance to live.  The lucky ones had been driven away and forced into banditry.  The unlucky ones had been killed out of hand.  No one, not even Merlin, could reverse transformations inflicted by wild magic.

He held back words of sympathy, knowing that Thorn would not accept pity, even from a Knight of the Round Table.  Instead, he watched as the foliage rustled and Thorn took his leave, before starting his own walk back to the village.  He could hear the Greenwood coming back to life – he’d barely been aware of the quiet in the clearing, near the lake – and kept one hand on his sword, ready to draw it at the first sign of a threat.  He could feel unseen eyes, colder and more inhuman than Thorn, watching him from a distance.  Strange sounds alarmingly close to him suggested that another creature – or many creatures – were stalking him, hidden within the greenery.  The footsteps were not human.

The prickling at the back of his neck only grew stronger as he approached the boundary line.  It was all he could do to keep walking steadily, expecting a blow to fall against his shoulders at any moment.  The sounds – and the sense of threat – just kept growing stronger and stronger.  A rustling behind him hinted that something inhuman had just stepped out onto the patch.  He glanced up sharply as a shadow fell over him and saw a mighty dragon, flying through the air, great golden eyes looking down at him with a great emotion he couldn’t even begin to recognise.  Dragons were rare in England.  To see one here, where Earth and Avalon touched, didn’t strike him as a good omen.

He crossed the boundary line without incident and turned to look back into the Greenwood.  There was nothing there, behind him; at least, nothing visible.  He could still feel unfriendly eyes watching him, biding their time.  Their owners might not choose to strike down Merlin’s representative, but they weren’t afraid of him.  Robin looked away and began a defiant march down to the village, holding himself together by sheer force of will.  Showing weakness to a supernatural creature, particularly one of the darker monstrosities was asking for a quick and painful death.  And death would be preferable to being held captive by one of the more powerful creatures, toyed with as a plaything until he broke.  The tales of unfortunates who had walked into Faerie and become unwilling guests at a Faerie Court had never seemed so real.  The entire human race owed Merlin a great debt for separating them from the supernatural world of Avalon.

Lucas was still waiting for him in the village, somewhat to Robin’s surprise.  It was easy to lose track of time in the Greenwood, even if one didn’t step off the path.  The Duke’s Heir looked relieved to see him, which had to be a first.  Or perhaps he was just worried about his father’s reaction if he’d lost Robin, a Knight of the Round Table.

“I have to go onwards to Camelot,” Robin said, once he’d explained and they’d shared a small meal.  They’d taken bread and cheese from one of the hovels, knowing that the rightful owners would never reclaim their land.  “I need you to warn your father to keep people away from this village.”

Lucas nodded, clearly more discomforted than he was prepared to show.  Robin concealed his own amusement.  Dark Sorcerers could rattle even a self-obsessed Duke’s Heir.  He kept Thorn’s warning to himself.  Merlin would have to be the first to know, if only to keep the Duke from trying to use it for political gain.  Merlin…and Tiffany.  The thought of seeing her again made everything worthwhile.

“Good luck,” he said, as he clambered back onto his horse.  Lucas would have no difficulty getting back alone.  Robin couldn’t resist showing off a little as he spurred his horse to a gallop.  “Goodbye!”

Lucas waved after him, and then he was gone.

Chapter Four

“Dark Sorcerers?”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said.  His father had started interrogating him as soon as he had returned to the castle, refusing his son permission to wash himself or even rub down his horse before he answered his father’s questions.  “Sir Robin was confident that the village was attacked by Dark Sorcerers.”

The Duke furrowed his brow in contemplation.  Lucas would have been surprised if his father had been outraged at the crime perpetrated against his vassals, but the Duke was more concerned with the danger of Dark Sorcerers in the Dukedom.  Magicians – even wizards – could be brought to heel by the nobility; Dark Sorcerers were hardly inclined to pay attention to a noble title.  The only thing they respected was power.

“And they took an entire village of mine, as bold as brass,” his father continued, thoughtfully.  “They must have been very confident that Camelot wouldn't detect their ritual before it was completed.  Merlin could have teleported an entire army in to deal with them before they could escape.  I wonder...”

His father trailed off into silent thought.  Lucas gritted his teeth, feeling the sweat pooling at the base of his armour.  He knew better than to interrupt his father’s chain of thought, or even to sneak off to his chambers, not before he’d been dismissed.  Angering his father was dangerous, even for his only son.  A servant who angered the master would be lucky to escape with only a savage beating.

“There have been rumours for a long time,” his father said, after several minutes.  He didn't bother to say what the rumours actually were, of course.  Knowledge was power and the Duke kept secrets even from his own son.  “Strange hints that something is very wrong in the Empire.”

Lucas started.  He’d been to Camelot when he’d been presented at Merlin’s Court – and several other times when he had accompanied his father to the Empire’s capital city – but he’d rarely bothered to pay attention to politics.  His father had once hoped that his son would be a willing ally in the incessant political wars that occupied the attention of the great nobles, yet Lucas had had little interest in politics.   It was all he could do to meet some of his father’s more extreme instructions.

“Of course, the Blackrock Affair doesn't help,” his father continued.  “The Duchy of Tara is weakening fast.  There are opportunities there, for those with the nerve and determination to seize them...”

He spoke on, while Lucas waited, trying not to show his boredom.  As a younger man, barely entering his teens, he’d thought that his father was sharing his world with his son, even one who had been something of a disappointment.  Later, he’d realised that his father just wanted to gloat over his own cleverness and Lucas was a convenient audience.  He’d never dare to share his father’s secrets with anyone outside the family – and besides, the Duke had only one other child, a daughter.  Little Emma would be married off to the best possible match as soon as she grew into maturity.  Lucas himself would probably inherit the Duchy without the slightest idea of how to wield its power, or to control the network of alliance and clients that his father had created to support his position.

“You will be taking lunch with Lady Gwendolyn in seven days,” his father said, finally.  Lucas blinked in surprise.  “The Heir to the Duchy of Tara will make a more than suitable replacement for Lady Tiffany – and even taking lunch with her will put the Duchess Blackrock in our debt.  I trust that you can manage that much without wreaking my plans?”

Lucas hated it when his father used his sarcastic tone.  His father considered him little more than a servant, yet he didn't dare run or even stand up for himself.  And Lady Gwendolyn...?  She was barely old enough to marry, ten years younger than Lucas himself, and hardly pleasant company for a young man.  As Heir to Tara – the Blackrock Family had produced no male heirs – her marriage would reshape the face of politics in the Empire.  If she was united with Lucas, himself a Heir...

“The Emperor may not allow the marriage,” his father continued, thoughtfully.  “And High Society may find reasons to object...”

They’d do more than that, Lucas knew.  With Duke Blackrock in the Tower of Camelot, waiting for Merlin’s judgement, Duchess Blackrock had been pushed to the outskirts of High Society.  Unless Merlin stripped her family of their rank and title, that wouldn't last, but for the moment the vultures were gathering.  An marriage alliance – or even a hint of an alliance – between Lucas and Lady Gwendolyn would rescue her position in High Society, whatever happened to her husband.  The thought was enough to make Lucas shudder.  High Society turned a blind eye to most perversions, if the practitioner was wealthy and powerful, but there were limits.  No one expected Duke Blackrock to leave the Tower of Camelot alive.

“You will, of course, be as dashing and handsome as you know how to be,” his father ordered.  Lucas nodded impatiently.  “And while you are talking with the Lady Gwendolyn, do try to avoid mentioning the Lady Tiffany.”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said, tiredly.  That, at least, he could have worked out for himself.  He pushed as much sarcasm into his voice as he dared.  “I won’t breathe a whisper of her name.”

It would definitely have wreaked his father’s plans, he thought, afterwards.  Lady Gwendolyn  had good reason to dislike Lady Tiffany.  After all, it had been Lady Tiffany who’d put Lady Gwendolyn’s father in the Tower – and almost certainly condemned him to death.

***
Centuries ago, in the semi-mythical time before Merlin, the British Isles had been invaded by the Romans, who had brought the benefits of their civilisation to a half-barbaric land.  They’d retreated from the islands several years before the rise of King Arthur, their Empire crumbling away from within and without, but they’d left behind them a formidable legacy.  Later, when the armies of the Pendragon Empire had crossed the channel and invaded Gaul – and Italy – the useful aspects of the heritage of the Roman Empire had been incorporated into Merlin’s Empire.  The straight roads that linked the cities and castles of the Pendragon Empire together had been crafted by Roman engineers.  Even with railways starting to allow faster transport between population centres – at least, unless one happened to have access to powerful magic – the roads still served as the main links between cities.  Robin, who had learned the art of military strategy at the Garrison, could appreciate what the Romans had done – and how they’d used their roads to build the greatest empire the world had seen, before Merlin.

He cantered down the road at a gallop, barely aware of passing hundreds of carts going to the nearest city or town.  Some lords insisted on their peasants handing over their produce to their agents – pocketing a hefty profit for themselves when they sold the produce onwards – but the Duke didn't seem to care if his people made some additional money on the side.  Or perhaps he did have strict laws and many of the peasants were risking his anger by selling their produce for themselves.  The level of freedom enjoyed by the peasants varied from lordship to lordship.

Robin galloped across a bridge and kept onwards, leaving the duchy behind.  The land closed in around the road, reminding him of the Greenwood, although there was little magic in the forest around him.  If memory served, the forest served as the dividing line between two separate lordships, providing a home for hermits, bandits and poachers.  Wise bandits would know to stay away from a Knight, or any escorted convoy.  Robin felt himself smiling as the horse kept moving.  Here, away from his duties, as if he were alone, he felt truly free.

Ahead of him, the road came to a sudden and abrupt halt.  Robin pulled on the horse’s reins and the beast cantered to a stop, leaving its rider unable to believe his eyes.  He’d ridden and walked down the road dozens of times since he’d left his home and enlisted at the Garrison...and he knew that the road kept going until it reached Rochester, one of the later free cities.  Robin reached for his sword as he slipped off the horse’s back, wondering just what had happened.  He knew he hadn't taken a wrong turning, if only because there were no other turnings once he’d passed the bridge.  And then he realised just how quiet it was.  There wasn't even any birdsong.

He drew his sword, peering ahead of him.  Where the road should have headed onwards into the distance, there was a flat patch of grass, with a tall stone building in the distance.  There was no sense of threat, oddly; his instincts were insisting that it was safe, if disconcerting.  He rubbed his hand against the horse’s flank, ordering the beast to remain where it was, and returned his sword to his scabbard.  Carefully, alert for a haze of magic that might signify an attack, he walked towards the building.  Up close, it was little more than a crude construction, yet there was something familiar about it.  There was no door, merely an opening  cut into the smooth stone.  Inside, there were stone pews and a single stone cross.

An odd legend, one he’d heard during his training at the barracks, echoed through his mind.  Old tales of Knights who had had encounters with holy entities on their travels, searching for the Holy Grail and other magical artefacts.  Robin removed his hand from his sword’s hilt as he stepped further into the building.  It felt as if he was stepping into a very holy place.  The very atmosphere suggested that it was waiting for someone to clear His throat and begin to speak.

Robin slowly removed his helmet, exposing his bare head.  As if the building had been waiting for him to show proper respect, a new light flared up in the far corner, blinding him for a long chilling moment.  When the light faded, he saw a pathway leading down to a lake, shimmering with blue light.  It should have scared him, he knew, for power on that scale was always dangerous.  Instead, he felt inhumanly calm as a figure began to appear in front of him.  There was still no sense of threat, merely...anticipation.

The figure took shape and form slowly, wavering against the light.  It – no, she – was wearing a white robe that revealed her femininity, but obscured her face, hiding it from his gaze.  He could barely make out hints of facial features, a small nose, warm lips...curved in a smile.  Her hair seemed to blur into her white robe.  Slowly, not quite aware of what he was doing, Robin went down on one knee.  The translucent figure nodded her head in acknowledgement, and turned, walking down towards the lake.  Robin, feeling an overpowering sense of grief and loss, followed her, as if he were walking in a trance.  She didn't look back as she reached the edge of the lake and stopped.

Robin halted too, keeping his distance from the translucent form.  It would have felt almost sacrilegious to approach her.  Robin was sworn to the ideals of Knighthood – to always respect and defend women – and yet, the translucent figure seemed to somehow transcendent the very notion of womanhood.  Strange flickering images seemed to lurk within the glowing form; a young maiden smiling coyly at him, an older woman holding a baby in one hand and a ladle in the other, an old crone fixing him with a gimlet eye.  He was being judged, he realised; the apparition was deciding his fate.  The thought should have alarmed him.  Instead, he still felt calm and composed.

The figure stepped forward, into the lake.  Robin could see, now, that the lake wasn't composed of water at all, but a shimmering mass of blue light.  The power seemed to crackle through the air, bright blue flames leaping up to consume her translucent form.  Robin opened his mouth to call out a warning, preparing himself to pull her from the flames, but she turned and smiled at him, a smile that weakened his knees and left him standing there, helplessly.  The flames crackled around her, yet they never seemed to touch her.  She turned again and kept walking, blue fires blurring around her.  For a second, he couldn't see her at all, and then...

She was walking back towards him, holding something in her hand.  Robin could see it squirming, as if he couldn't quite see it properly.  He’d seen creatures from Avalon that were impossible to make out, as if there was something about their form that was impossible for humans to perceive, but this was different.  The object seemed to be deciding on a form suitable for his eyes.  As she came closer, it blurred and stabilised into a long sword, wrapped in a jewelled scabbard.  She held it out to Robin, hilt first.  Slowly, as if he were sleepwalking, he reached out and took it from her.  A sudden wave of blue fire swept from the hilt and into his hand, running up his arm and into his body, but there was no pain.  The sword felt..good, right in his hand.  It felt almost as if it were a part of him.

Carefully, he drew the sword from the scabbard.  It wasn't made of metal; it seemed to be made out of shimmering light.  He couldn't see his own reflection in the blade.  The sword’s presence hung in the air, as if it were somehow more real than anything else.  Robin stared at it, realising – for the first time – that he knew its name.  Excalibur, the legendary sword of King Arthur, lost ever since his death at the hands of his bastard son.  He’d steeped himself in the legends as part of his training, yet little was known for sure.  Some stories claimed that Merlin had created the sword as a gift for the one man he’d acknowledged as his lord; others claimed that Excalibur was far older, dating back to when God created the Heavens and the Earth.  The Knights of the Round Table had quested for it many times, ever since Merlin had rebuilt the Order.  None had ever come close to finding it.  Some had even wondered, privately, if the sword had been destroyed.

Robin looked up at the translucent figure.  Many of the older stories were metaphors, he’d been told, ways to teach humanity truths without overwhelming the listeners.  If the sword was Excalibur, the female figure had to be the Lady of the Lake, the living representative of the Land itself.  He was in the presence of the embodiment of the entire world.  He started to open his mouth, to stutter that he was not worthy of such a gift, but she merely smiled.  In her smile, there was an acceptance and regard that quelled his own doubts and fears.  Slowly, he returned Excalibur to its scabbard.  She smiled at him once more...

...and the blue fire leapt up at him, surrounding him in blue light.  When the light faded, he found himself standing beside his horse, which was contentedly nibbling the grass growing along the roadside.  The road stretched away towards Rochester.  By the position of the sun in the sky, it was clear that the whole encounter had taken no more than a few minutes.  It had felt like hours.  He’d been taken into Avalon, to the enchanted land of myth and legend...if it hadn't been for the sword in his hand, he would have wondered if he’d fallen asleep and dreamed everything.  It should have been impossible.  He was a long way from the Greenwood.  No merely human magician could wield power on such a scale.

He looked down at the sword and scabbard.  Even sheathed within the jewelled scabbard – which had powers of its own, if he remembered correctly – Excalibur seemed to glow with power and light.  Magical artefacts could be sensed by magicians and sorcerers – and Excalibur was one of the most powerful of all.  Every magician for a hundred miles around would be aware of its presence, if they opened their inner eyes to see.  The sheer power would leave them in no doubt that something very old and powerful had returned to the land.

Carefully, he removed his own sword and placed Excalibur’s scabbard against his belt.  He wasn't surprised to discover that it nestled there as if it had always belonged there, even though he’d never considered himself worthy of it.  All the legends somehow seemed paltry and weak compared to the reality.  The sword was far more than just a sword.  If half of the legends were true...

Robin slowly pulled himself back onto his horse, remembering Thorn’s warnings.  The Faerie and the other supernatural creatures were anticipating a change, one that would reshape the world.  And Excalibur had just returned to the human lands.  Somehow, Robin didn't believe that it was a coincidence.  If Excalibur, perhaps the most powerful artefact from myth and legend, had returned, who knew what else was going to returning to the fixed lands?

He touched the sword one final time and spurred the horse onwards.  He could be in Camelot within a day, where he could report to Merlin – and Tiffany.  Merlin would remember what had happened the last time Excalibur had been held by a human hand; he’d be able to advise Robin on what to do with the sword.  Besides, he had to report the existence of a cabal of Dark Sorcerers.  They’d sense the return of Excalibur themselves.  His lips twitched in black humour.  Who knew – perhaps they would sense the sword’s presence and go hide under the bed, rather than causing trouble.

Pushing the thought aside, he cantered onwards, praying that the rest of the trip passed uneventfully.  One more surprise would be the end of him.

Chapter Five

If her mother could see her, she’d die of shame on the spot.

Lady Tiffany of Shalott, First Councillor to the Emperor Merlin, stood in the locomotive’s cabin and laughed as the train raced down towards Camelot.  The air stank of burning coal, her expensive white dress was stained with grease and dust, the wind blew her long red hair out behind her...and she’d never been happier.  Her heart beat in time with the rumblings of the engine, ignoring the driver and fireman as they fought to control the mighty metal beast, wishing that the ride would never end.  It would, she knew, and she would have to go back to her duties, but until then...she could pretend.

Camelot slowly came into view as the train rounded a corner, following the river that flowed down from Shalott.   Merlin’s capital city glittered in the sunlight, the towers of the Iron Palace reaching up towards the sky.  To the unknowing eye, Camelot looked fragile, as if one strong gust of wind would blow it over and send it crashing to the ground, but appearances were deceiving.  Merlin’s magic ran through the Iron Palace, shaping it out of the ground and holding it steady.  It was far stronger than the remainder of the city.

Even at a distance, Tiffany could sense Merlin’s presence, a dark brooding shimmer of magic that could neither be denied or ignored.  The city’s inhabitants had grown used to living in Merlin’s shadow, although she knew that very few of the nobility chose to make their home permanently in Camelot.  They didn't like to be reminded of Merlin’s presence, or his power over their lives.  A word from Merlin could see the strongest and most aristocratic bloodline reduced to cringing beggars, struggling to survive on the streets of an unforgiving city.  And if a noble family fell so lightly, its members could count themselves lucky indeed.

It wasn't the original Camelot, of course.  That fair palace, remembered now only in myths and legends, had been destroyed by Arthur’s bastard son, in the early days of his uprising against his father.  Its fall had marked the end of one golden age as son fought father across the land, until blood strained the fields and hills of England and two mighty armies met for the final battle.  And when Arthur had fallen, Merlin had awoken and returned to the land and proclaimed his rule.  The Iron Palace, composed from cold iron and shaped by Merlin’s will, was both an demonstration of his power and a sign that no one could stand against him.  No one had even come close to matching Merlin, not in all the years since he’d taken the throne.

The outskirts of the city were great manors, each one belonging to one of the noble families, or one of the immensely wealthy – if not titled – merchant princes.  You weren't anyone in High Society if you didn't have a mansion in Camelot; even under Merlin’s shadow, it was still the place to be for anyone who wanted a political career.  Tiffany concealed a smile as the train swept past the latest mansion, one built by a newly-wealthy merchant for his wife and daughters.  It was notably lacking in charm, elegance or even good taste.  The word on the streets was that the merchant was seeking society marriages for his daughters.  Tiffany suspected that it would end in tears.

She felt an odd sense of dislocation as the train plunged through the first layer of wards surrounding the inner city, protecting Merlin’s capital city from all comers.  Merlin’s wards were dauntingly powerful, even when compared to wards created by massed teams of sorcerers.  Tiffany could normally read wards, even if she couldn't break them, but Merlin’s always appeared to be nothing more than intangible lines of power, just waiting for someone foolish enough to challenge them.  Inside the wards, the sense of Merlin’s presence was suddenly much stronger, a chilling reminder that there was no way to hide from him if he chose to look for her.  His presence pervaded the entire complex.

The train slowed to a halt as it entered the station, a relatively new building amidst the houses that held the men and women who kept the Pendragon Empire running smoothly.  Tiffany shook her head slowly, feeling duty settling around her like a shroud, and muttered a charm under her breath as the train slid to a halt.  Magic shimmered around her and when it was gone, her white robe was as clean as it had been the day she’d first donned it, when Merlin had appointed her to his Privy Council.  The day he’d made her the most important – and powerful – woman in the Empire.

She nodded her head to the driver and stepped off the train, down onto the platform.  She’d deliberately avoided bringing any guards with her – very few would dare to attack Merlin’s First Councillor – even though she knew that it would worry her friends.  There were nobles who had raised entire armies of guardsmen and summoned hundreds of magicians to their banner, but Tiffany had never seen the point.  She didn't need a private army to prove her power to anyone, not when she wore Merlin’s Ring.  It allowed her to draw on a tiny fraction of Merlin’s power, marking her out as his servant.  Everyone who was anyone – or thought they were – would know who she was.  She could see a handful of people watching her from a distance, or heading off to report to their masters, as she walked down towards the road.  The entire city would know that she’d returned.  News travelled quickly in Merlin’s Empire.

The Iron Triangle rose up in front of her as she walked up the road, heading directly for the Iron Palace.  The three points of the Iron Triangle – the Houses of Parliament, the Keep and the Great College of Beneficence – surrounded the Iron Palace, keeping the men and women who ran the Empire – from the great nobles to the clerks working away at their desks – under Merlin’s unblinking eye.  Tiffany knew that very few of them would dare to act openly against the Empire, or against Merlin’s will.  His power was a constant remainder of their vulnerability.  A number had made themselves wealthy by serving Merlin, but that, at least, was acceptable.  It bespoke a thinking mind that could be put to work elsewhere.

She frowned as she reached the gardens and looked down, towards the Tower of Camelot.  Anywhere else, the Tower of Camelot would have stood out like a beacon and magicians could have sensed it from hundreds of miles away.  Here, so close to Merlin’s presence, it was almost impossible to sense it, or the hundreds of wards protecting it and keeping the handful of prisoners locked inside.  Two weeks ago, just before she’d returned to Shalott, she’d had a very important prisoner confined to the Tower, awaiting Merlin’s judgement.  The tiny flickers in the wards, barely detectable even for her, told Tiffany that the prisoner was still confined.  Merlin had made no decision about his fate.

Up close, the Iron Palace seemed almost defenceless.  There were no walls surrounded it, nor were there any guards on the great stone gates that led into the palace.  There was no need of physical defences, not when Merlin was his own, all-powerful protector.  Tiffany had heard that his enemies had tried to kill him in many different ways, from direct physical assaults to more subtle poisons and deadly potions, but nothing had ever worked.  Merlin had even been beheaded once, according to the legends, and it hadn't done more than amused him.  He’d picked up his head, placed it back on his neck, and then blasted his attacker into atoms.  He didn't even seem to notice poison.

Bracing herself, Tiffany walked forward, into the antechamber.  The crowd was waiting for her, as she’d expected.  The great and good of the Empire, demanding to see Merlin’s First Councillor; the braver were even demanding to see Merlin himself.  Tiffany remembered how she’d been tempted to just run the first time she’d faced the crowd, but showing weakness at Camelot could be fatal.  The Court might know better than to try to dispose Merlin, yet that wouldn't stop them concentrating their malice – and ambition – against his First Councillor.

Ignoring the babble, she looked from person to person, silently noting who was there – and who wasn’t.  There were nearly a hundred aristocrats, each one ignoring the others magnificently, if only because Merlin had banned fighting within his palace.  The seven families had been feuding for the past four years – ever since a complicated marriage alliance had fallen apart – and they all expected Tiffany to rule in their favour.  They weren't particularly powerful families and Tiffany had been quietly ignoring the whole issue as much as possible.  With the Blackrock Scandal still unresolved, the greater nobility had been keeping a very low profile.  They probably feared what would be discovered if Merlin started peering in their direction.  

Behind the aristocrats, a number of magicians – more than usual – waited for her attention.  Merlin had always encouraged other magicians to attend his Court, although many of the more powerful ones preferred to avoid it where possible.  The wizards knew that they’d never be able to match Merlin and resented it.  A handful of sorcerers stood near them, with the rest of the crowd giving them a wide birth.  Everyone knew that sorcerers were unstable, even the ones who survived burning new magical channels in their mind without going insane.  No one wanted to be near the men in black if they decided to start turning people into frogs left, right and centre.  They’d have to be insane to start causing trouble in Merlin’s palace, but calmly was a occupational hazard where sorcery was concerned.  Tiffany nodded to them cloudily, frowning inwardly.  It was rare to see more than two sorcerers together.  They always started picking fights with each other.  Their presence suggested trouble.

Puzzled, she looked closer at the magicians.  Many of them were from outside England, making their first visit to Camelot.  There were slant-eyed wizards from Han, with long fingernails and cruel moustaches that had frightened her as a young child.  The magicians could have cut their fingernails, save only that that would have cost them half their power.  Dark-skinned fakers from Hindi, turban-wearing mystics from the Fertile Crescent of Persia and nearly-naked black shamans from Nubia.   The mystics had little real power of their own – their magical traditions didn't embrace inner power – but they controlled powerful genies in the lanterns they wore at their wrists.  Merlin had once killed one of them in single combat – a genie possessed vast power, with little regard for how it was used – yet few others could match such a feat.  The mystics were regarded warily by the crowd, although they weren't treated as dangerously irrational sorcerers.

She passed through the crowd, saying sweet nothings and pretending that she was above their babbling concerns.  Inwardly, she was listening carefully and filing everything away in her mind.  The free cities wanted to petition Merlin for an expansion of the Charter of Rights.  A group of peasants – in hard-worn clothes, with hard-worn expressions – wanted their local aristocrats to relax their price controls on seeds and livestock.  The chances were good that they were being backed by one of the merchant princes, but that didn't mean that they didn't have a case.  Tiffany knew what Robin would have wanted her to do – hear their case at once, and then rule in their favour – yet she just didn't have time.  Two weeks ago, she’d attempted to defuse a nasty political scandal by placing the ball in Merlin’s court and taking a fortnight off.  And nothing, it seemed, had been done.

As if the thought had been enough to summon her, Duchess Blackrock materialised out of the crowd, throwing herself into Tiffany’s path.  A short, rather frumpy woman, her appearance was disguised and altered by a magical glamour surrounding her.  She wanted to look tall and commanding, but Tiffany didn't need Merlin’s help to raise her Sight and peer through the glamour to the woman beneath.  Duchess Blackrock looked terrified, but then...she had good reason to be worried about the future.  Her husband was locked away in the Tower, awaiting Merlin’s judgement.  And Merlin tended to be indiscriminate when he was throwing his wrath around.  There was a good chance that the Duchess would lose her title, transforming her from one of the most powerful women in the world to a helpless dependent, relying on her relatives for food and shelter.

“Lady Tiffany,” the Duchess said, grabbing Tiffany’s hand.  She had a shrill, rather nasal voice.  The crueller wags in the Court had wondered if she had a Siren somewhere in her ancestry.  “You cannot keep my husband locked up in the Tower!  It’s cruel!”

Tiffany wasn't fooled by the act.  The Duchess knew what her husband had been doing when he'd been caught, red-handed.  In her place, Tiffany would have abandoned her husband at once, throwing him under the wheels of Merlin’s justice.  Instead...the Duchess had been working away at the House of Lords, bringing all the pressure to bear that she could, hoping to convince the Lords to petition Merlin to pardon Duke Blackrock.  Tiffany had hoped to pre-empt her by putting the affair before Merlin.

“He’s a Duke,” the Duchess continued.  She still hadn't let go of Tiffany’s hand.  “He shouldn't be locked away...”

There had always been rumours about Duke Blackrock, one of the thirteen Dukes – the most powerful aristocrats in the Empire.  Tiffany had spent enough time at Court to know that all rumours should be taken with a very large grain of salt; why, rumour had it that Tiffany and Merlin were lovers.  Mud stuck, particularly when people wanted to believe the rumours.  The Duke had been untouchable, until a Knight of the Round Table had led a raid on an unmarked house in one of the Duke’s towns.  He'd discovered the Duke in the act of raping a small girl, barely old enough to walk on her own.  And then the Duke had tried to claim aristocratic rights...

Tiffany, speaking for Merlin, had ordered an investigation – and kept the Duke under lock and key.  The investigators had discovered that the Duke had been raping children for years, ever since he’d inherited from his father.  No one knew how many children had been raped and murdered, but even one would have shocked Camelot.  And he hadn't even been slaughtering children for black rituals.  He should have been hung, at once, but his wife fought desperately to save his life.  Tiffany had hoped that Merlin would render the issue moot before the political struggle turned violent.  Her hope had not been fulfilled.

The Duchess stepped back when Tiffany met her eyes, allowing her to walk onwards towards the second set of iron doors.  They opened in front of her as she approached, slamming closed behind her and cutting off the noise from the crowd.  Tiffany pushed their concerns to the back of her mind as she walked through the immense room, trying to ignore the ghostly apparitions that flickered in and out of existence in front of her.  Merlin’s presence, he’d explained once, bent the very laws of time and space.  The apparitions were glimpses of alternate worlds, or the past – or, sometimes, the future.  They’d always given Tiffany shivers.  

She saw, just for an instant, a man she didn't recognise, carrying a sword that glittered with light.  He was gone before she could read the marks on his shield, which would have told her who he had sworn loyalty to, as part of the ceremony that had raised him to knighthood.  She sucked in her breath sharply as she saw Robin, smiling down at her, before he vanished back into the mists of time.  A sad nun appeared, shook her head at Tiffany, and then vanished again.  King Arthur stood in front of her, his calm eyes seeming to look right into her soul before he smiled and nodded – and vanished.  Tiffany found herself wiping away a tear.  Merlin had told her that Arthur had been the True King, the only man to whom Merlin had ever bent the knee, but Tiffany hadn't really believed him, not until now.  She couldn't escape the thought that Arthur’s appearance meant something very significant.

And then a single image appeared in front of her and she recoiled in shock.  She saw herself, kneeling on the iron floor, her hands bound behind her back with chains of cold iron.  Naked, her head was bowed, her long flowering hair falling down to cover her breasts and give her what little modesty she could.  There was someone sitting in front of her, seated on the Iron Throne, but she couldn't make out a face.  And then her duplicate raised her head to meet Tiffany’s eyes...and the hopelessness she saw deep within her own face sent cold shivers running down her back.  She looked little older than Tiffany herself.

Merlin had said, when she’d asked him as a young girl, that the apparitions didn't mean anything.  They were just shadows of possible worlds, of things that had never happened and never would happen, futures that sprang from different pasts.  Sometimes, a person would see the true future, but it was rare.  Or so he’d told her.  Somehow, it was no comfort to recall his words.  It was hard to reject the belief that that...hopelessness didn't lie in her future.

She strode forward, keeping her eyes closed, until she reached the third set of doors.  If she hadn't been welcome, they would have stayed resolutely shut, bound by a will so absolute that every wizard in the empire couldn't have opened them.  They slid open for her and Tiffany almost ran into the chamber, feeling almost like a scared little girl again.  The apparition didn't follow.  Breathing heavily, she calmed herself as best as she could and looked up towards the Iron Throne.

Merlin Mekratrig, Son of Satan Mekratrig, born to be the Antichrist, was waiting for her.

Chapter Six

The impact of Merlin’s presence hit her like a physical blow.

Tiffany had faced him many times before, but the effect was always the same.  Merlin’s very presence made her bend the knee to him, a gesture of respect that came from her very soul.  She’d heard younger nobles, scions of dynasties that went all the way back to King Arthur, speak scornfully of the old man on the throne.  They’d never faced him in person, never even felt his presence focused on them and them alone.  Merlin, the son of the second-most powerful being in all of Creation, could bring them all to heel with a wave of his hand.

He was tall, with a thin body that seemed almost too small for the black robes he wore, yet burned with energy.  Even trying to look at him through normal eyes was hard, as if there was something about him that was beyond human perception.  Her Sight was useless against him; trying to look at him through her inner eye was like staring into the sun.  His long white beard seemed to curl and move of its own accord, twisting carelessly through the air.  And his eyes were hooded with shadow, dark pools that seemed to suck the life out of the air itself.  Power crackled around him, his very presence bending reality, as if nothing was solid.  The Iron Throne, his seat of power, seemed almost weak and fragile compared to him.  It was simply impossible to look directly at him for long.

And yet, something was...wrong.  Tiffany couldn't have said how she knew, for Merlin seemed to be as powerful as ever.  It was hard to focus her mind in his presence, something that was hardly new...she must have been dazed, because she should have seen it at once.  Merlin normally reined in his presence once she’d knelt to him, allowing her to talk properly without stuttering, and to look at him without her eyes beginning to water.  Instead...he seemed to have forgotten, as if his mind were wandering.  And yet, Merlin never forgot anything.

She frowned, wondering desperately if she’d made him angry.  Merlin had delegated his power and authority to her, allowing her to speak with his voice.  Tiffany knew better than to abuse the trust he’d placed in her, for a word from her could alter the destiny of the entire empire.  She’d wondered, at first, why Merlin felt that he needed someone to speak for him to his Court.  It had taken years before she’d realised that people weren't so scared of her as they were of Merlin.  They’d actually make suggestions and critical remarks to her that they’d never dare make to their lord and master.  And she’d learned to incorporate their comments into her own plans and proposals.

Had she displeased him?  She’d calculated that Merlin would judge Lord Blackrock, find him guilty and execute him before she returned from Shalott.  There had been no other choice.  If she’d judged him herself, Duchess Blackrock would have brought all the pressure she could muster to bear on Shalott – and Tiffany personally.  Hundreds of arrangements Tiffany had created to help the Empire function would be thrown into jeopardy.  It seemed insane to her that the Duchess would risk so much for a child-raping piece of shit, Duke or no Duke, but it would have happened.  Perhaps the Duchess truly loved her man.

But no one would have questioned Merlin if he’d executed the Duke.  His judgement would have been final.  There would have been no appeal.  The Empire would have remained stable, the Duke’s Heir would have inherited and few of the Duchess’s allies would risk confronting Merlin.  And yet...had he wished her to handle the Duke herself?  Was he angry that she’d tried to manipulate the situation – or even him personally?

Merlin spoke finally – and Tiffany was shocked.  He sounded tired, yet he had never sounded tired, not in all the years she’d known him.  Merlin was the immortal Emperor of the Pendragon Empire; he’d been ruler for a thousand years and would be ruling for a thousand years after Tiffany was dust, her children long gone.  To hear him sounding...tired was terrifying.

“I do not wish to be bothered,” he said.  There were times when Tiffany could feel magic in his words, as if he didn't need to draw on the magical speech to create magic words.  Now, he just sounded very old.  “You will inform the Court that they will not attend on me today.”

Tiffany swallowed, hard.  Showing weakness at Camelot was never a good idea.  It had been a long time since the last serious challenge the Empire had faced – the Serpent Wars – and there were plenty of lesser nobility who would see opportunity in any hint of weakness.  They would have to be insane to challenge Merlin openly, but they could burrow away at his position and try to secure additional power for themselves.  Tiffany might have been First Councillor, yet everyone knew that she drew her power from her master.  A threat to his position was a threat to hers.

Years ago, when she’d just turned twelve, her father had died.  Her mother, the Dowager Lady Aloha of Shalott, had brought her to Camelot, presenting her before Merlin as tradition demanded.  Merlin had claimed the right to approve all Heirs personally centuries ago and few dared to dispute it with him.  Tiffany, already young and precocious, had despaired.  Her mother, whose interests were limited to clothes, jewellery and socialising, would want to marry her only daughter off as soon as possible, rather than allow her to develop her magical talents and learn how to rule Shalott.  But when she’d faced Merlin, the ancient sorcerer had plucked her out of the crowd and ordered a place to be prepared for her at Beneficence, the greatest college of magic in the world.  Her mother had known better than to argue, at least in front of Merlin.

Her studies hadn't been easy, even with the title she’d inherited from her father.  Few women studied magic formally, even noblewomen.  She’d faced opposition from her fellow students, many of whom had hazed her during her first year in the college.  But she’d learned quickly, developing the skill to ward herself and her possessions – and eventually to fight back against her tormentors.  It had been years before she’d realised that the college had pushed her deliberately, forcing her to develop her wizardry to its fullest possible extent.  And by the time she’d graduated, Tiffany had been beating wizards with years of experience.

Merlin had summoned her the following year and appointed her to his Privy Council.  She’d done well, so well that she’d replaced Merlin’s old First Councillor when he’d finally retired.  It had irritated the Court to have to pay respect to a slip of a girl – she’d wondered at times if that had been the point – but she’d overcome the first challenges and earned respect.  And now...something was badly wrong.

“My Lord,” she said, finally, “there are issues that we need to discuss.”

Merlin turned his great head and looked down at her.  She was shocked to see how slowly he moved, as if it was a great struggle to move.  The power shimmering around him seemed to be congealing, flickering with flashes of blue light.  Merlin seemed to be having difficulty speaking...just for a second, she wondered if he could be under a curse.  But who was powerful enough to curse Merlin, the most powerful being in the world?

“Duke Blackrock can wait,” Merlin said.  He sounded...unconcerned.  Once, he would have ordered the Duke brought before him and executed him in a manner that would have lived on in infamy.  He'd done that once, just after Tiffany had graduated, and the sheer horror of the death had stopped the nobles from plotting for nearly a week.  “I do not wish to be troubled with him at this time.”

A hundred questions thundered through Tiffany’s head, but she had the sense not to say any of them out loud.  Why had he allowed her to visit him if all he wanted to do was to send her away?  Why had he even allowed the Court to gather if he intended to dismiss them at once?  And why hadn’t he dealt with Duke Blackrock?  High rank was no protection against Merlin’s judgement.

Something moved behind her and she started, turning to see one of the Husks.  The Husks had once been Merlin’s enemies, until Merlin had reached out with his magic and rewritten their souls, turning them into his servants.  The aristocracy used spell-controlled slaves as a matter of course, but that process was reversible.  Even Merlin couldn't return a Husk to humanity.  Their very existence was an abomination, which was partly why Merlin kept them around.  They were an chilling reminder of his absolute power.

“Go,” Merlin ordered.

Tiffany opened her mouth to argue, but it was too late.  She found herself standing in the antechamber, teleported out as casually as one might walk across a room.  The ring on her finger felt warm, yet when she looked at it there was nothing to indicate that she’d lost Merlin’s favour.  Confused, she walked back out of the antechamber and faced the crowd.  They’d expected to see Merlin, not her.  It took nearly an hour before she managed to dismiss them, promising that she’d see to it that they were summoned again when Merlin was ready to see them.  She scowled as the last of the visitors hurried out the door and sighed.  They’d blame her if Merlin refused to see them a second time.

She walked outside, feeling a gust of cold air striking her in the face.  Camelot lacked the heavy walls of other castles and fortresses and there was little protection for the unwary visitor.  Muttering a charm under her breath, she started walking down the path towards Beneficence – and the Library of St Jude.  It had been weeks since she’d last had a chance to visit, but she needed some advice.  And besides, most of the Court wouldn’t think to look for her in a library.  They’d probably never looked at a book since they’d graduated from school.  Merlin insisted that everyone – even peasants – were taught basic literacy and numbers, but more than that was strictly optional.  Noblemen didn't need to know how to read, write or manage their own accounts.  They hired men to do it for them.

The Great College of Beneficence was an enormous mass of blocky stone, far larger on the inside than on the outside.  Countless wizards had created the spells that held the College together, binding it in place with powerful wards and anchors.  Merlin had created Camelot and the castle’s winding passageways all on his own, back before there had ever been a College for Wizardry – and there were no anchors holding Camelot in place.  It was yet another demonstration of his power.

Another demonstration caught her eye as she entered the College’s grounds.  An iron cage stood in front of her, crackling with blue sparks.  Inside, an elf hung in the centre of the cage, cold iron rammed through his body.  The elves were effectively immortal – Tiffany had never heard of one dying naturally – and his body was fighting to regenerate, but the cold iron prevented any of his wounds from closing.  He’d been fighting the battle for over four hundred years, trapped between life and death.  Merlin had caught him, caged him and sentenced him to perpetual torture.  No mere human could do that to an elf.

As a student, she’d seen older students tormenting the elf, throwing pieces of cold iron at its body or singing hymns loudly, knowing that the elf would cringe away from the holy names.  It had sickened her, even though the elves were eternal enemies of mankind.  They had demanded respect before Merlin, slaughtering and tormenting entire human communities to get the respect they believed they deserved, before Merlin had driven them back and forced them to abide by his rules.  And yet...the elves had never forgotten.  They could wait for eternity for revenge, if necessary.

Beside the College, the Library of St Jude was almost unnoticeable.  The Sorcerer Roark had designed it that way, intending to ensure that only the most trusted individuals were allowed to see the building, let alone gain entry.  Tiffany, as Merlin’s First Councillor, had the right of access, but few others did.  If she was lucky, one of the others would be here – and they could chat.  There was little time for chat these days.

“Tiffany,” Lady Aylia called.  She was a tall thin girl, with long brown hair and a faintly impatient air.  She was also the most accomplished female wizard in the world.  Merlin had appointed her Mistress of Beneficence College and Lady Librarian of Camelot four years ago and she’d grown into the job, even though she insisted on spending at least two hours a day in the library.  “Welcome back.”

Tiffany smiled at her friend as she sat down on one of the comfortable, if ugly, sofas.  The Library of St Jude looked ramshackle on the inside, with stacks of books piled up everywhere and a handful of cats wandering around as if they owned the place.  The Sorcerer Roark had crafted powerful spells to allow visitors to find what they were looking for, but sometime after he’d died a poltergeist had moved in and disrupted the entire order, at least until Aylia had faced the unfriendly ghost down and convinced it to work properly.  If she’d had the time, she would have spent two hours in the library every day herself.

“Things are worrying,” she said, as Aylia passed her a cup of coffee.  The early explorers had brought it back from overseas and it had rapidly proven a hit among the nobility.  “I was at Court today.”

Aylia listened carefully as Tiffany explained what had happened, sharing her puzzlement with her friend.  It wasn't a breach of Merlin’s confidence; he’d appointed Aylia to his Privy Council a year after he’d made her Mistress of Beneficence.  Tiffany had wondered if he had a habit of picking people with few ties back home, for Aylia had effectively run away from her family to train as a wizard.  And Tiffany preferred not to speak to her mother, if it could be avoided.

“It’s hard to know what he’s thinking,” Aylia said, finally.  Tiffany snorted.  Merlin was ancient, with a memory that stretched back over a thousand years.  It was often difficult to predict what he’d do; sometimes he backed the aristocracy, sometimes the commoners and sometimes he just let things work themselves out on their own.  “Didn’t you read Marxovich’s latest book?”

Tiffany scowled.  Marxovich was a lesser nobleman from Tchernobog, born to the aristocracy, yet unlikely to ever inherit a title or any real authority.  He’d become a scholar instead and thrown himself into studies of the ancient past, the time before Merlin.  His third book had been a study of Merlin’s history, noting all the different legends and contradictions that flourished throughout the Empire.  Some claimed that Merlin had met Arthur as a young man, others that Merlin had used magic to ensure that Arthur’s father bedded his mother, impregnating her with the child who would become king.

His fifth book had been hugely successful, at least until the Tribunal had closed down the printing presses and ordered the book destroyed.  He’d studied the nature of the empire itself, concluding that Merlin had creating a social structure that balanced between commoners and aristocrats, maintaining his own grip on power with very little effort.  Under the circumstances, he’d been lucky not to be executed for sedition.  The book was officially banned, which hadn't stopped hundreds of young aristocrats from reading it and discussing its contents, in private.

“Yes,” Tiffany said, slowly.  Marxovich had concluded that if Merlin lost interest in ruling, the result was likely to be absolute chaos.  “I think...”

She stopped.  Someone had come in behind her, someone familiar.  She turned and saw Robin standing there, smiling at her.  Without quite being aware that she’d moved, she found herself in his arms, hugging him tightly.  Their love had been a surprise to both of them and had outraged High Society – after all, she was the Lady of Shallot – until Merlin had ruled in their favour.  Besides, a Knight of the Round Table was nobility.  That had been established long ago.

And there was something different about him.

“Robin,” she said, slowly.  “What’s happened to you?”

Robin reached for the sword at his belt and half-drew it out of the scabbard.  The sword’s presence hit her at once, a glowing beacon of magic in her mind.  The wards around the library might shield its presence from the remainder of Camelot, but there was no mistaking it.  Tiffany wanted to reach out and touch the sword, but something held her hand back.  She wasn't worthy to touch it.  If the legends were true, anyone unworthy who tried to take the sword would burn to death, instantly.

She couldn't find the words to speak.  Aylia seemed to be just as stunned.  The last time Excalibur had been wielded by a man, that man had become King of England and inaugurated the First Golden Age.  And now...

A second figure entered the library, moving with slow deliberate movements.  Robin spun around to face the Husk, returning Excalibur to its scabbard, as if he feared what the soulless creature would do.  Tiffany wanted to shout at him to run, half-afraid that Merlin would react badly to Excalibur’s return.  There were factions at Court that would try to proclaim Robin King, trusting in the mythical sword to protect them against Merlin...

The Husk spoke as if it wasn't used to speaking.  “Sir Robin,” it said, “you are commanded to present yourself before the Emperor Merlin.”

Robin showed no trace of fear.  “I understand,” he said.  Husks were rarely seen outside the Iron Palace.  Merlin using one as a messenger merely underlined the importance of the message.  “I’m on my way.”

Chapter Seven

Robin could feel Excalibur humming at his belt as he followed the Husk into Merlin’s presence.  His magical talent had always been weak, but he’d been able to sense the wards surrounding the Iron Palace – until now.  Excalibur’s mere presence seemed to push them away, as if they refused to touch its bearer.  Robin remembered the many stories surrounding the sword and shivered.  It had made Arthur the King of England.  The Emperor might not be too pleased to see it again.

The Husk stopped, allowing Robin to walk past it and up to the Iron Throne.  Merlin’s presence was as strong as ever, but somehow it didn’t send Robin crashing to his knees.  The sword was protecting him, shielding him from the power.  Robin considered, briefly, and then dropped to one knee, a gesture of respect.  Merlin had created the Empire and united the world.  He’d protected humanity from the supernatural terrors that had once plagued the night.  And he’d refused to become the Antichrist, the destroyer of all that was good and noble in humanity.  He deserved respect.

Robin hadn’t seen Merlin for six months, ever since he’d granted Robin and Tiffany permission to wed.  The change in the ancient sorcerer shocked him.  Merlin had always looked old, but now he looked as if he were reaching the end of his span.  He’d been strong and focused, even though he was far older than even the oldest natural-born magician in the world.  Now, he looked as if the last fractions of his life were slowly draining away.  Robin had always been told that Merlin was immortal, that there was nothing that could kill the son of the darkest creature in the universe, but now...Robin wondered if he’d believed a lie.

“Rise,” Merlin said.  Even his voice was different.  He spoke as if each word cost him a year of his remaining lifespan.  “You are welcome in my Court.”

He fell back into silence.  Robin waited, unsure of what to say or do.  He’d been extensively trained in protocol, but Merlin rarely demanded total adherence to courtly etiquette.  Social graces intended to demonstrate and enforce a pecking order hardly mattered to one whose supremacy was unchallengeable.  Merlin had little tolerance for stupidity or arrogance, but he allowed people to argue with him.  Only a few dared.

“You were given the sword,” Merlin said.  It wasn't a question.  Excalibur was so powerful that every magician in the city would have sensed its presence, even against the deadening effect of Merlin’s own magical field.  And Merlin had his own ways to See, ways that no ward or ritual could block. “Draw it, please.”

Robin hesitated, and then half-drew the sword from the scabbard.  Excalibur blazed with light, as if it had been constructed from a star, or as if the primal wild magic had been bound into its creation.  Its mere presence seemed to send the shadows scurrying backwards, as if they knew that they had no place in the room.  Merlin leaned forward, as eagerly as a small child awaiting his birthday presents, and yet…there was something oddly restrained about his movement.

“Pull it out completely,” Merlin ordered.  Robin obeyed, feeling the sword’s power blurring into his soul.  Excalibur felt…good for him; it felt right in his hand.  The sword was almost part of him.  Absently, unaware of why he moved, he ran through a series of movements with the sword.  He’d been trained in swordplay, just like every other Knight, but this was different.  The sword was pushing his natural abilities right to the limit.

Merlin seemed almost hypnotized by the white glow.  “The sword left the land a very long time ago,” he said.  His voice was so low that Robin had to strain to hear him.  “I gave it to the Lady of the Lake and she took it away, until it was needed again.”

Robin swallowed, hard.  “Your Majesty…does this mean that I’m the King?”

Merlin laughed, harshly.  Some of the tension seemed to vanish from the massive chamber.  “I’m afraid that that offer was only meant once,” he said.  Oddly, he seemed amused, rather than angry at the implicit challenge to his power.  Robin didn’t feel reassured, even though he was holding the most powerful weapon in the world in his hand.  “Arthur wasn’t made King because he had Excalibur.  He was given Excalibur, for a time, because he was King in the truest possible sense.  He was trusted by his people and he deserved that trust.  He worked for their betterment until the day he fell, killed by his treacherous son.”

Robin nodded, slowly.  Merlin remembered everything.  Events that were lost in the mists of time, or barely understood by modern scholars – Merlin recalled them all.  The legends said that Arthur had pulled Excalibur out of the Stone of Destiny to become King, yet if Merlin was telling the truth…Robin shook his head, pushing that thought aside.  Merlin had no reason to lie to him, even though he was holding Excalibur.  The one weapon, perhaps, that could destroy the most powerful man in the land.

“It isn’t really a sword,” Merlin added, a moment later.  “It looks like one because your mind needs something that it can understand, but it is far more than it seems.  If it stays with you, you may come to understand its true nature better than you do now, or you may never learn to look past the sword to the…true form underneath.”

That was…odd, Robin decided.  “Who forged the sword?”

Merlin smiled, thoughtfully.  “No one knows,” he said, finally.  “I was given the credit for it back in Arthur’s day, but the sword is a great deal older than myself.  The legends say that it came out of the east, carried by Alexander as he conquered most of the known world, only to vanish again when the great warlord died.  It resurfaced later in Gaul, to be presented to Julius Caesar just before he marched on Rome and defeated his enemies.  The sword was carried back to Egypt by Marcus Antonius when he fled Rome, fearing the wrath of Caesar’s adopted son.  But Marcus attempted to pervert the power in the sword and was destroyed for his imprudence.  His lover threw the sword away before she was bitten by an asp.

“The Lady of the Lake gave it to Arthur after he’d been crowned King,” he added, a moment later.  “And when Arthur died…the sword fell back out of history, waiting.  And now it has resurfaced.”

Robin felt brave enough to ask another question.  “My Lord,” he said, carefully, “who is the Lady of the Lake?”

Merlin snorted, irritably.  “She is one of the primal forces of the land,” he said, flatly.  “Not human; never human, not even partly human.  She serves the land itself.  She has not been seen for a thousand years.  Her return now bodes ill.”

He lapsed back into contemplation, almost as if he’d forgotten Robin – and Excalibur.  Robin watched him carefully, his mind ticking over thoughtfully.  A thousand years…Merlin had been on the throne for a thousand years, ruling with an iron hand.  The boundary lines had been drawn, keeping a barrier between humanity and the supernatural.  Had the Lady of the Lake been barred from rematerialising by Merlin?  And if so, what did her return portend for the future?

Merlin looked up suddenly and fired a series of questions at him, demanding to know everything about his encounter with the Lady of the Lake.  Robin tried to explain about the Dark Sorcerers and the threat they posed to the Empire, but Merlin simply dismissed the matter.  Robin wasn't sure if Merlin intended to deal with them himself – even a cabal of Dark Sorcerers couldn’t hope to stand against Merlin – or if he was simply uninterested in their appearance.  Excalibur blazed with light; Merlin, watching the sword, seemed somehow diminished in its light.

“My Lord,” Robin said, finally.  “Do you wish Excalibur…?”

“No,” Merlin said, flatly.  He looked…unsure, although Robin couldn’t tell why he was unsure.  “Excalibur was given to you.  You will wield it until you die.  An unworthy man who takes the sword will find that possessing it against its will is dangerous.  And when you die, it will go back into legend until it is needed again.”

He leaned forward, the dark pools of his eyes somehow standing against the sword’s glow.  “I told Arthur that the sword didn’t make him invincible,” he said, coldly.  “No Object of Power is unbeatable, even one that dates back to the Time of Legend, when Gods walked the Earth.  Be warned; the sword is only as good as its user – and it has a mind of its own.”

Robin frowned.  Holding Excalibur felt…right, as if the sword had been made for him.  The power within the sword had fused with his soul.  It felt trustworthy, as if it would be there for him as long as he was worthy of the blade.  He didn’t feel worthy, but there was a trust and acceptance in the sword’s presence.  The sword seemed to think that he was worthy.  Robin felt humbled by the trust placed in him.  Merlin’s warnings didn’t seem…real.

“You must take care of Tiffany,” Merlin added, sitting back on his throne.  The remaining tension in the chamber had evaporated.  “She is going to bear a heavy burden in the weeks and months to come.  Be there for her, but never forget that you are a Knight of the Round Table, the finest men to walk the land.  You will be needed by the Empire.”

Robin frowned.  The Knights weren't forbidden to marry – only sex outside of marriage was forbidden, as it tainted their image – but it was rare for a serving Knight to marry, certainly to someone who was his social superior.  And yet…the love he felt for Tiffany burned through him, even if the Court had sneered. Excalibur seemed more amused than offended by the thought that there might be another woman in his life.

They’d planned their wedding in a month, at the Summer Palace near Londinium.  Merlin had created the palace as a place he could rest, back when he’d been new to ruling, but it had fallen into disuse until the aristocrats had started to use it as neutral ground.  Merlin had tolerated it, even though he’d known that they’d started using his palace to plot, confident that they could not be overhead.

“I do not envy you our burden,” Merlin said.  “You are dismissed.”

Robin opened his mouth to argue…and found himself outside the throne room, Excalibur glowing in his hand.  The sword seemed brighter somehow, even outside the half-darkness of Merlin’s chambers.  Robin stared down at the sword for a long moment and then returned it to its scabbard, grimly aware that every magician within the city – or further away – would have felt its presence.  Some of them would risk everything to capture such an Object of Power.

Shaking his head, he started to thread his way through the long corridors.  Tiffany would be waiting for him.

***
Merlin slowly relaxed as the glow left by Excalibur’s presence faded from his chambers.  He prided himself on never forgetting anything and yet, somehow, the sword’s sheer presence had slipped from his mind.  It was yet another sign of his impending death, he told himself, refusing to believe the alternative.  A thousand years ago, he’d made a bargain with his father.  And one of the terms had been that Excalibur had to be sent into Avalon, far from humanity, far from anyone who could wield the blade.

His father was the Lord of Lies, the Master of Darkness, the Adversary of God – and very little worried him.  Why should it?  He was one of the most powerful beings in Creation – and yet, Excalibur made him nervous.  At one point, Merlin had hoped to use the sword against his father, but Excalibur had refused to be used.  Merlin had had to use trickery to throw the sword into Avalon and bar the Lady of the Lake from ever returning.  He'd told himself that it was necessary, that he could rule without Excalibur or any divine right to rule – and he had, for a thousand years.  And his time was running out.

He looked down at his hand, searchingly.  A mundane human, without even the Sight, would have seen an old hand, flesh and blood.  A magician would have seen mystical energies – the most powerful in the world – burning through the flesh, endlessly consuming Merlin’s body and soul.  Only his colossal will had kept Merlin from burning up, consumed by his own power – his will, and the terms of the deal he had struck with his father.  It had been too long since he’d faced his own unshielded power, a thousand years since he’d mastered the eternal pain that had tormented him since he’d been ripped screaming from his mother’s womb. A hundred years before Merlin’s birth, the Virgin Mary had had a peaceful childbirth, bringing the Son of God into the human world.  Merlin’s father had wanted to cause pain – and his mother, a witch who’d sold herself to the darkness, hadn’t survived Merlin’s birth.

Pain flared through his body, taunting him.  He’d known the moment the Lady of the Lake materialised in the human world, for that had marked the end of his bargain with his father, the end of a long thousand years.  Mortal flesh and blood wasn’t designed to contain mystical energies for very long, even the relatively puny energies gathered and wielded by sorcerers.  Half-bloods rarely lasted long; Merlin’s longevity owed as much to his bargain as it did to his force of will.  His father had thought that it was a great jest; the Antichrist, the one who would rule the world and crush God’s finest creation, would himself be tormented by his very nature.  Merlin wondered, sometimes, if he would have been more inclined to accept his destiny if his father had shown him a little love and kindness.  But then, Satan was the distillation of pure evil.  Love and kindness were alien to him.

A thousand years ago, the terms of the bargain hadn’t seemed onerous.  Merlin had been desperate to avenge his friend and monarch, to make his dream real and bring about a new era of peace and prosperity.  Now…time was running out.  His father would come for him soon, demanding that Merlin fulfil the final terms of the contract.  And there would be no escape.  Merlin had placed himself into the devil’s hand; nothing, not even repenting his sins, would save him.  Heaven would refuse to help the devil’s son.

Carefully, very carefully, Merlin drew on his power.  Over the years, scholars and political agitators – they thought Merlin couldn’t hear them, even though he heard every time his name was spoken out loud – had wondered why Merlin didn’t simply impose a peace on the entire world.  Why did he need the Knights of the Round Table, or the Garrison, or the Dragon Queens?  A handful had even questioned Merlin’s near-omnipotence, wondering in whispers if Merlin was simply a very powerful sorcerer who had somehow cracked the secret of making the legendary serum of immortality.  They had never understood the truth.

The world was fragile.  Powerful creatures – angels and devils – would break the world if they were allowed unrestrained freedom to act as they pleased.  The Divine Presence Himself had decreed that no such creature could act freely on Earth, without something summoning and binding them to the mundane plane.  Merlin possessed half the power of Satan himself, enough to destroy the entire world if he lost control.  He used tools and allies because he didn’t dare draw too much on his power.  The results might have been catastrophic.

Merlin reached out, slowly, closing his eyes.  He’d seen much in the years he’d wandered the Earth before discovering Arthur – and a chance to upset his father’s long-term plans for humanity.  He’d learned that there were other worlds and realms out there, some so close to humanity’s world that they could step across with only a little effort, others so far and distant that even Merlin would be hard-pressed to reach them.  Somewhere, out among the dimensions, he’d find a way to avoid paying his father the final part of the bargain.  It was a final desperate gamble, but there was no choice.

The power grew as he pressed against reality itself.  There were creatures out there, creatures so alien and powerful that their mere presence would have destroyed the world, at least as humanity knew it.  Merlin could hear them scratching at the walls of reality, waiting patiently for some fool to open a door to allow them entry.  That was the true danger of sorcery; not madness, not a megalomania that would force the sorcerer to claim more and more power for himself, but breaking down the fragile walls and allowing incomprehensible monsters to enter the fragile human world.  Even rule by the Antichrist – the next Antichrist – would be preferable to rule by those monsters.

Merlin opened his eyes.  Ahead of him, in front of the Iron Throne, was a simple wooden door.  It looked simple, but Merlin could sense the raw power crawling over the wood, holding it in place.  Like Excalibur, like many other Objects of Power, it had assumed a form that human minds could comprehend.  It was far more than just a gateway to other worlds and universes.  It was…indescribable, even for Merlin.  It had no place in the human world.

Standing up, Merlin made a gesture with his left hand and the door opened.  The path lay beyond, inviting him to step on a route that would take him to his final destination.  Merlin, without looking back at his throne, or the Husks waiting for his orders in the shadows, stepped forward and walked through the door, right out of the human world.  It closed behind him silently.

A moment later, it was gone.

Chapter Eight

Tiffany paced the confines of the Privy Chamber, unable to control her fear.

Her lover had Excalibur.  Her lover had an Object of Power that was very much a legend.  Her lover had a sword that had symbolised Arthur’s rule – and confirmed him as the King of England.  She cursed herself under her breath, unsure why she was so nervous – and fearful.  Her father had told her to listen to her instincts – and every one she had was telling her to run.  But where could she run, even if she’d been prepared to abandon her oaths to Merlin?

Merlin had shaped the Privy Chamber himself, but his councillors had decorated it over the years.  Colossal paintings depicting events back in the Empire’s past – from Merlin’s defeat of the Witch-King of Bavaria to the destruction of the Serpent Empire – were scattered around the chamber, reminding the councillors that history looked down upon them from the future.  She was far from the first to serve Merlin and she would hardly be the last.  Her stewardship wouldn't last forever.

Outside, she could tell that the Court was already reforming itself.  Robin had Excalibur; the mere presence of the enchanted blade would attract vultures, each one keen to find a way to turn this latest development to their advantage.  Tiffany felt tired, rubbing her eyes as if she hadn't slept for a week.  She didn't have the strength to deal with the Court, not now.  Perhaps Merlin would simply banish them from his palace and talk to her again, as he had before she’d left for a brief vacation.  Perhaps...

She looked up sharply as the door opened, revealing Robin.  Excalibur was sheathed at his belt, hidden inside a jewelled scabbard, but she could feel the sword’s presence from right across the room.  It was unmistakable.  The Empire had thousands of enchanted or cursed blades, yet Excalibur was in a class of its own.  And now it had resurfaced, the hundreds of different factions would be trying to find a way to get their own hands on the legendary sword.  They could use it to pressure anyone, even Merlin himself.  She didn't even want to think about the consequences of that, not when Robin was alive and unharmed.  She practically ran across the room and into his arms.

He held her, just as tightly.  Tiffany allowed herself a moment of weakness, not something she would have dared show in public, and relaxed into his arms.  The sword’s presence became oddly muted, as if Excalibur was choosing to leave the young couple some privacy.  It bothered Tiffany, even though she appreciated the gesture; she’d seen too many Objects of Power with their own agendas.  Only a year ago, the Dread Bloody Blade had resurfaced and sent a lone madman on a quest to slaughter everyone in his country.  The Tribunal had dealt with the madman – who had been a victim of the blade himself, driven mad by its deadly and subtle whispers – but the blade itself had vanished, again.  Tiffany had no doubt that it would resurface soon.  Objects of Power with dark intentions were always seen again.

“Robin,” she said, leaning up to kiss him.  She just wanted to ride off with him and forget everything, but she knew that that wasn’t possible.  Technically, they shouldn't even be alone together, not before the wedding.  On the other hand, Merlin had given them his blessing, her mother was a hundred miles away and no one apart from Merlin himself could spy within the Iron Palace.  And Merlin would know to grant them some privacy.  “I...”

Merlin’s presence snapped out of existence.

Tiffany started, jumping backwards and shouting in alarm.  She’d always been aware of Merlin’s brooding presence pervading the walls of his palace, ever since she’d first visited Camelot.  Now...the presence was gone.  It was impossible, yet no matter how she tried to expand her senses and feel Merlin’s presence, she sensed nothing.  The flickers of magic representing other magicians and sorcerers, normally drowned out by Merlin’s sheer power, appeared at the back of her mind.  A moment later, she realised that the wards protecting the Iron Palace had fallen as well.

Robin was staring at her.  He hadn't understood.  Most magicians knew to anchor their wards in solid matter, ensuring that they weren't drawing from their power reserves, but Merlin had never needed to worry about such trifles.  He’d had power to burn, and enough concentration to keep the wards – and everything else – in existence without either losing his mind or draining his reserves down to nothing.  The sheer complexity of the spells he used to channel his power into the wards were an order of magnitude more complex than anything any other magic-user could produce.

“Merlin,” she gasped.  She felt the ring he’d placed on her finger personally, the ring that allowed her to call on a fraction of Merlin’s power, her argument of last resort.  Few had dared to argue with her when she’d drawn on Merlin’s vast reserves...but the ring was cold and she couldn't feel the power.  The ring had always been warm to her touch.  “Robin...he’s gone!”

Robin touched Excalibur, as if the blade could provide answers.  But nothing seemed to be forthcoming.  Tiffany reached out with her Sight, looking for answers herself, cursing her limited reserves.  She’d grown far too used to depending on Merlin, to the point where she’d been drawing on his power without conscious intention.  Now...now she was dependent upon her own reserves, and while she was a skilful wizard, she’d never had the time to develop her reserves.  The Iron Palace seemed almost completely devoid of magic.  Outside, the mighty wards that protected Camelot were fading away.

“But...where?”  Robin asked.  The Knight looked shocked, but he hadn't taken his hand off Excalibur’s hilt.  Tiffany wondered, insanely, if Robin had slain his liege lord, yet that should have been impossible.  Besides, Merlin hadn't vanished – she refused to believe that he was dead – until after Robin had returned to her.  “How can he be gone?”

Tiffany opened her mouth to answer, but heard shouting outside before she could speak.  She was hardly the only person in the Iron Palace with a magical talent; Merlin looked for such talents in his servants and assistants.  Everyone would have sensed his departure, and the fall of the wards.  She led the way to the door and stepped out, into a scene from hell.  The massive bookcases that dominated the Grand Corridor seemed to have exploded, scattering their contents over the floors.  The Courtiers had scattered, some clearly injured by flying books.  Tiffany stared at them in disbelief.  How could the shelves have simply exploded...

A horrifying thought struck her, so horrifying that she didn't want to even consider the possibility.  Before she could speak, although she had no idea what she would have said, there was an almighty crash.  A section of the roof, halfway around the palace, had fallen in, smashing through the floors and plummeting downwards.  Her worst nightmares were coming true.  The Iron Palace had been held upright by Merlin’s magic...and Merlin was gone.  The bookshelves, which had been magically enhanced to allow the servants to cram far more books onto the shelves than anyone would have believed possible, would only be the first to go.  Tiffany had heard reports of enchanted castles – built on clouds, or impossibly weak foundations – that had collapsed when their builders died, or ran out of magic.  And the Iron Palace had nothing, apart from Merlin’s magic, holding it up...

“Get out,” she bellowed, drawing on her magic to amplify her voice throughout the entire structure.  It crossed her mind that they might not obey her now, even though she was the Lady of Shallot.  Merlin was gone; who needed his First Councillor?  Another series of crashes underlined her words and anyone who might have been inclined to dispute her authority shut up.  “Everyone out, now!”

The entire structure was shaking madly, each crash sending terrifying shockwaves through the entire building.  Tiffany saw the High Magus and a group of his apprentices on the other side of the corridor and yelled at them to try and stabilise the building as long as possible.  Magic had its limits and only Merlin had ever been able to build and maintain something the size of the Iron Palace, even without the pocket dimensions and warps that made it so much bigger on the outside.  The floor started to give under her feet and Tiffany almost fell, before Robin caught her and leapt over the rapidly expanding crevice.  His army gave him a boost as he ran down the corridor, forcing the servants and courtiers to run.  Tiffany saw a wall disintegrate in front of her with a terrifying sound, revealing the shape of the Houses of Parliament in the distance.  The MPs would have to be shaking in their shoes, wondering if Merlin was feeling angry...but some of them would have magical talents.  They'd know that Merlin was gone.

An ear-splitting crash sent Robin and her tumbling to the floor.  She pulled herself to her feet, cursing her hugely impractical dress.  A group of servants ran past her, screaming.  Their entire world was coming apart at the seams.  The High Magus and his team were roaring and chanting and raising their wards, but even the High Magus’s sorcery couldn't hold the Iron Palace for long.  A great section of the wall tumbled outwards, falling down towards the gardens.  Tiffany prayed with a fevour she rarely felt that no one had been underneath it when it fell.  Robin caught her arm and thrust her onwards.  She ran, drawing on her own power and feeding it into the High Magus’s network of spells.  Every little fraction of power would help.

Robin bellowed a vile word as another section of the wall fell, revealing a group of children, young noble children who had been making their first visit to the Iron Palace.  They were trapped, screaming for help as the building disintegrated around them.  Their chaperones, mostly minor nobility desperate to forge alliances – or hint at such alliances – with Merlin, weren't in any better state.  None of them had any real talent, or they would have been trained and put to work serving their families.  Robin turned, drawing on the  white-gold armour and leaping up towards where the children were cowering.  As Tiffany watched, he caught the first child and hurled her towards the High Magus.  Magic shimmered around her, breaking her fall.  The other children followed, still screaming.  A handful had blood trickling down their ears, a sign that they’d been exposed to a powerful magic field.  Or, perhaps, slammed with the sudden absence of a powerful magic field.

Tiffany waited a fraction of a second too long as Robin leapt back towards her.  A piece of debris fell from high above, right down towards where she was standing.  Time seemed to slow down as she reached for her power, but she’d funnelled almost everything left in her reserves to the High Magus.  Her legs refused to work, leaving her staring Lady Death in the face...and then Robin was there.  Excalibur, a blade of shimmering light, sliced through the chunk of debris and destroyed it.  Tiffany found her legs working again as Robin caught her arm and ran for her life.  The High Magus bellowed a final series of charms into the air and followed them, his legs pumping desperately as he ran.  Tiffany had a moment when she was sure that they wouldn't make it out before the ceiling came down on their heads, and then they were running through the great iron doors and out into the gardens.  She kept running as the ground shook time and time again, great chunks of iron debris slamming into the gardens.  The pounding seemed never-ending.  If anything, it was growing louder.

She caught herself and turned to look, watching in horror as the final collapse began.  Merlin had crafted the Iron Palace personally, creating a network of spindly towers and minarets that reflected the different arts and civilisations from all over the Empire.  It had been, in its own way, a remarkable work of art, as solid and omnipresent as the Empire’s master.  It had been a visible expression of his will, a mocking reminder to the supernatural that Merlin, humanity’s protector and champion, had no need to fear cold iron.  And now it was gone.

One by one, the remaining towers toppled inwards, crashing down towards the ground.  Each fall set off the next one, until the entire structure came tumbling down.  The noise only grew louder as the remaining pocket dimensions collapsed, some expelling their contents violently back into the world, others simply vanishing without a trace.  Her attention was caught by the statue of King Arthur, one crafted by Merlin himself, that had been mounted on the north gate of the palace.  It had clearly been secured by iron as well as magic, an odd gesture from Merlin, but it was dangerously unstable.

Tiffany felt weak, uncertain of what to do, as the statue started to fall.  She’d studied it often when she’d arrived at Camelot, wondering what kind of mortal man had been able to command Merlin, the son of the Devil.  Arthur had had a kind face, one chiselled from granite, and muscles on his muscles.  She’d once asked Merlin if he’d not created an idealised statue of his former friend and monarch, but he’d insisted that he’d remembered Arthur perfectly.  No mortal man could have had so many muscles and walked upright, unless Excalibur had helped to shape his body.  The sword had many powers and the legends only hinted at some of them.

The statue hit the ground with a mighty crash.  Silence fell, broken only by screaming and calls for help.  Tiffany watched, feeling...empty inside as the dust slowly began to settle.  Merlin was gone.  The most prominent sign of his power was gone.  She felt as if she had gone beyond behind horrified, into a cold numbness that tore at her mind and refused to allow her to think.  She knew she should do something, but what?  No magician could hope to restore the Iron Palace to its former glory.  She couldn't take her eyes off the pile of rubble.  Merlin’s greatest legacy was gone.

Robin caught her arm.  “You have to take command,” he whispered, so quietly that only she could hear.  Tiffany wanted to shake him off, but she could barely move.  Without Merlin’s presence, Excalibur was suddenly brighter, even in its scabbard.  “Look at them.  They’re panicking.  They need leadership or someone is going to do something stupid.”

Tiffany looked up.  The gardens were packed with courtiers, magicians, sorcerers and noblemen, staring at the wreaked palace.  Many were injured, blood streaming down their faces or with broken bones; others looked to be in shock, gripping their wands and weapons as if they expected to find an enemy they could fight.  None of them could believe what had happened.  Merlin hadn't just dominated their lives; he’d dominated their ancestors lives as well, all the way back to King Arthur’s time.  And now he was gone.  Would they obey her, now that the source of her authority was gone?

She pushed all the authority, all the regal bearing her mother had taught her over the years, into her voice.  “Magicians, start healing the wounded,” she ordered.  Magic could be used to heal most wounds, but it was often expensive.  She braced herself for an argument, yet no one seemed inclined to pick a fight.  They were in shock, then, or perhaps they were just scared of Excalibur.  Robin stood behind her, one hand on the sword’s hilt.  “Everyone unwounded, start working on helping the wounded away from the building...”

A troop of soldiers from the Garrison arrived and started to help restore order.  Tiffany continued to bark orders, organising rescue and healing parties and transporting the wounded into the Houses of Parliament.  Some of the MPs had come out to help, she noticed with some amusement; even MPs who were at each other’s throats on the debate floor were working together to help.  The High Magus summoned other magicians from Beneficence and the various guilds in the city, putting them to work on the wounded.  They wouldn't allow themselves to be pushed around for long, not now Merlin was gone, but for the moment they would help.

She glanced to the north and bit back a curse.  The Tower of Camelot hadn't fallen – it hadn't been raised using magic, unlike the Iron Palace – but most of the wards around it would have fallen.  There weren't many prisoners in the Tower at the moment, yet...what if they’d escaped?  What if Duke Blackrock had escaped?

“Robin, take a set of soldiers and a magician to the Tower,” she ordered, grimly.  “If they’re escaping, kill them.”

He nodded and headed off, taking Excalibur with him.  Tiffany mentally ran through the list of prisoners, muttering under her breath.  Most of them were relatively harmless, but at least one of them was a trained wizard.  He’d have sensed the weakened wards, if only because his powers wouldn't have been constantly drained any longer.  And if he had enough time to regain some of his powers, he could escape into Camelot.  Without the city-wide wards, he could cause real trouble...

She looked over at the pile of debris again and shuddered.  Everyone was working together – now.  How long would it be before they got over the shock and started wondering what to do next?  What would they do, now that Merlin was gone?  They’d never have a better chance to take complete control...

“Damn you,” she whispered, under her breath.  Merlin had been...aging.  She hadn't wanted to admit it to herself, but it was unavoidable.  Merlin had been growing old.  The immortal ruler had been far from immortal.  “Why did you have to leave us?”

Chapter Nine

Merlin was gone.

There was no doubt.  Merlin’s presence had been omnipresent to those with the Sight, a constant nagging presence at the back of their minds.  Even hundreds of miles from Camelot, magicians could sense him – and now it was gone.  There could be no mistake.  Merlin’s presence had never faded, never retired as age or sleep overcame its master.  And now there was a gaping hole at the heart of the empire.  Merlin was gone.

He stood on one of the ruined buildings, hands raised upwards to the dark skies, staring down at a scene of unimaginable devastation.  Kentigern had once been one of the wealthiest free cities in the empire, parlaying its position on the west coast of Scotland into a trading empire had had helped to bind the Empire closer together.  The great shipbuilders of Kentigern had constructed the mighty ships that had sailed to far-distant Han, or Oceania; the master tradesmen had produced devices sought throughout the entire world.  A bright future had beckoned for a city many had believed to be touched by God.  And then disaster had struck.

Like most of the free cities, Kentigern had played host to hundreds of magicians who weren't inclined to swear fealty to one of the lords.  One magician, scarcely more than a stripling if the stories were to be believed, had been desperate to gain power.  That was hardly uncommon among magicians, particularly ones without any formal training in wizardry, but few were stupid enough to try to summon one of the Great Demons and bargain with it.  The infernal being had broken out of the wards that should have held it, killed the fool of a magician instantly and rampaged through the city.  Fifty thousand men, women and children had died in the first chilling moments of its onslaught.  It had taken an entire army of magicians and sorcerers to drive the beast back to Hell – and by the time it was finally banished, the city had been ruined.

A mundane eye would have seen nothing, until it was far too late.  One with the Sight could see dark pools of infernal energy, polluting the landscape and warping the local wildlife.  The handful of unfortunates who’d wandered into the ruined city – hoping to recover some of the loot that was supposed to be buried under the ground – had been twisted by the magic, transformed into shambling beasts that roamed the countryside, seeking blood.  Merlin’s servants had established wards to warn anyone else not to enter – and to trap the beats inside – and left the city strictly alone.  The dark magic flickering through the ruins provided more than enough camouflage to hide an entire demonic army.  It was more than enough to hide the Dark Sorcerers.

The Dark Sorcerer Maledict laughed as rain started to fall, glancing off the ground and splashing around his robes.  Even the weather in the city couldn’t be trusted; strange energies ran through the rain, suggesting deadly danger – and promise.  Maledict had warded himself thoroughly, as had the rest of his small cabal, yet even he couldn’t stand in the rain for long.  He’d drawn on wild magic to turn himself into a sorcerer, risking madness or death, but even his power had limits.  Or so he’d been led to believe.

His laughter grew louder, more high-pitched, as eerie sheets of lightning started to flash through the darkening skies.  It was easy to believe that the land was mourning Merlin, even though his death – or disappearance – opened up all kinds of opportunities for his enemies.  Merlin had been part of the land, part of the network of power that had held the land together, for centuries.  Everyone had thought that he was immortal, until he’d died.  Or disappeared.  It was impossible to tell for certain…

Maledict looked down towards a handful of buildings, old factories that had been abandoned, after the demon had slaughtered the workers who’d made their lives toiling for their masters. A man didn’t have to have an aristocratic title to be a bastard, a fact Maledict knew well.  He’d been born in a similar building, nearly fifty years ago.  It had been a hard life for anyone newly come from the fields, escaping the nobles only to discover that he had walked into another form of servitude.  His father had never recovered, drinking himself to death over five years, while his mother had simply lost the will to live.  The boy who would become Maledict – he’d forgotten his real name years ago, part of the price he’d paid to become a sorcerer – had found himself an orphan, beaten and kicked by those stronger than himself.  He’d been a beggar, a street urchin and then a thief, narrowly escaping capture and certain death a hundred times.  His luck would have run out eventually…

And then he’d met the old man, who’d found in him a gift for magic, a gift he’d never known he’d had.  The young boy had done whatever was necessary to find the money to pay for lessons, until the day he’d mastered a handful of killing spells and murdered the remains of the street gang that had abused him, laughing aloud as they died in fear and torment.  He’d snapped that day, he knew; that night, he’d murdered his teacher, stolen his few books and Objects of Power, and headed out seeking…power.  He’d never had power in his life, not until he’d started to master magic, and the taste of it was intoxicating.  He could do anything he wanted, to anyone.

Perhaps he’d been mad all along, but only a madman would have even considered challenging Merlin. It had been risky as hell to draw on wild magic, gouging out new channels in his brain to expand his powers, yet he’d survived.  And if he took delight in pointless cruelty, or had the occasional discussion with people who weren't there, it was a small price to pay for ultimate power.  And yet, there was Merlin.  Merlin, the magician who effortlessly dominated and intimidated every other magician in the land; Merlin, the magician who wielded supreme power; Merlin…the magician who Maledict dreamed of supplementing, of taking all his power for himself.

He rubbed his hands together as he saw flickers of his own reflection in the torrential downfall.  He’d solved a problem that countless sorcerers had tried and failed to master; he’d found a reliable way to create new sorcerers without killing them outright.  A third of all magicians who attempted to become sorcerers died in the attempt and two-thirds of the survivors went mad and had to be destroyed.  Maledict didn’t care if his followers were insane; it would only make them more powerful and terrifying to those who had bent the knee to Merlin.  He’d told himself that one day he’d have enough sorcerers under his control to face Merlin, to strike down the all-powerful magician who ruled the land…and now Merlin was gone!  And he had the most powerful army in the land.

Maledict reached out with his mind, feeling the flickering pools of dark magic bubbling through the city – and, beyond them, the presence of his followers.  Some had been lowly magicians with little real power, desperate to do anything to gain power – and with it, rank and station.  Others had been ambitious, or desperate; a handful even had started believing that Merlin was evil and that anything was acceptable to remove him from power.  Maledict didn’t care what had brought them to him originally, not now that he’d reached into their minds and transformed them all into sorcerers, sorcerers who depended on him for their power.

Lightning flashed again, followed rapidly by a rolling peal of thunder.  Maledict turned and walked towards the hatch that led down to the building below, a mansion that had once belonged to a merchant family.  Abandoned ever since the city itself had been abandoned, even though it was almost intact, it had proven an excellent base for the Dark Sorcerers.  Even if Merlin and his lapdogs had known where they were, they’d have problems finding them in the city, if only because they were shrouded by the dark magic.  He gestured with his right hand and the hatch slid open, allowing him to levitate down into the darkened chambers below.  There was no need for light, even that supplied by a thief’s lantern. The Dark Sorcerers welcomed the darkness.  It was their home.

The handful of Dark Sorcerers awaiting him dropped to their knees as he passed, refusing to meet his terrifying gaze.  Maledict smiled openly and felt their shudders, knowing that they feared him – as was proper, as the world had once feared Merlin.  The Dark Sorcerers had committed themselves to his cause when they’d joined him and taken part in the dark rituals that had summoned and stored up power for their transformations into sorcerers.  After they’d gleefully participated in torturing, slaughtering and finally sacrificing innocent children, Merlin’s enforcers would show them no mercy.  They had nowhere else to go.

He snapped his fingers and the mirror ahead of him, charmed to show him anywhere in the world, provided that it was not warded against magician prying, let up with an eerie glow.  For a moment, he saw his own reflection and laughed, knowing that anyone who saw him without a concealing cloak or glamour would know him for what he was, a Dark Sorcerer.  Maledict was fifty years old, yet he looked well over a hundred – and dark power burned in his eyes.  Sorcery had many prices for the booms it granted to those who wanted power.  His warped and twisted body was only a small price to pay for his vast power.

Absently, he plucked one of the sorcerers out of the kneeling pack and summoned him forward.  Finding the young man had been a stroke of luck, despite the risks involved in seducing him and offering him more power than even Merlin’s chief enforcers could wield; he’d thought seriously about refusing the opportunity – but how it had paid off!  And if Merlin was truly gone, he’d never have a better chance to take power for himself.

“Master,” the young man said.  Maledict considered him thoughtfully.  He was young, barely seventeen; his face bearing the marks of a harsh upbringing and a father who cared little for his bastard son.  Magic ran in the noble bloodlines, but it was diluted over the generations.  This young man had been a disappointment to his father, with only limited gifts.  It had taken sorcery to grant him powers he’d never dreamed could be his.  “I live only to serve you.”

Maledict cackled.  The young fool was right, even though he had no conception of the true nature of his servitude.  Mortal men, even sorcerers, could only bear a small amount of magic before it burned them out and left them piles of dust and ash.  Maledict had solved that problem, at least for a short while, by sharing out his power among his followers and using them as a base for his reserves.  It drove many of them insane, unable to understand or control whatever was happening to them, but there was no shortage of victims.

“I wish you to return to your father, when he arrives at Camelot,” Maledict ordered.  He’d never dared visit Camelot, even before becoming a sorcerer.  Legend had it that the wards around Camelot would detect a Dark Sorcerer and capture him before he could enter the city – but now the wards were gone.  “You will tell him that I wish to discuss an alliance.”

Merely taking power wouldn't be enough, Maledict knew.  He’d need allies, at least at first, if only to ensure that the Empire Merlin had created didn’t fall apart before he could bend it to his will.  And afterwards, his allies would be the first to discover that one didn’t make a bargain with a Dark Sorcerer.  As soon as the alliance had outlived its utility, Maledict would see to its dissolution and the death of his allies.  When the Empire was his, he would depend on no one to maintain his power.

He laughed again, savouring the moment.

With Merlin gone, all of his dreams could be made real – now.

***
An hour after the Iron Palace had collapsed, after the world had turned upside down, the recovery work was still going on.  Countless volunteers – some more willing than others – were working to move the wounded out of the way until they could be treated by the healers and alchemists.  Seekers – magicians with talents for finding people or objects – were picking their way carefully through the rubble, looking for survivors who might be trapped down in the darkness.  A handful of sorcerers were even trying to move great chunks of iron out of the way, although their interest was hardly altruistic.  Every time a magician died, his neighbours tried to seize their Objects of Power and books before they were lost, either to his heirs or to the Tribunal.  Merlin had had the greatest collection of Objects of Power in the world and every sorcerer and wizard worth their salt wanted them.

Robin rubbed his tired eyes as he directed recovery efforts.  Tiffany had left him in charge as soon as he’d returned from the Tower of Camelot, with barely a moment to give him a hug.  He missed her dreadfully, even though duty told him that they had to focus on the recovery and save as many lives as they could.  Besides, if Merlin was really gone, all hell was likely to break loose.

He scowled as he felt a reassuring shimmer from the sword at his belt.  Magicians, even sorcerers, were obeying him without question, or even argument.  And that was eerie.  Trying to get three or more sorcerers to cooperate was like herding cats, when the cats could snap their fingers and transform the imprudent speaker into toads, or slugs, or stone statues.  And they were obeying him, a Knight of the Round Table.  Even when Merlin had been…present, the sorcerers had resisted submission to anyone below Merlin, even his appointed First Councillor.  Sorcerers respected nothing, but power – and Excalibur was power incarnate.  He saw, out of the corner of his eye, a number of magicians eying him speculatively.  A moment of weakness and they’d be trying to steal the sword.  Excalibur wouldn't allow an unworthy man to use it, but a magician, given enough time, could probably find a way to draw on the sword’s power.  Sorcerers were always teetering on the brink of insanity.  The thought of something as powerful as Excalibur would tempt them, no matter how hard they tried to deny it – or how insane any thought of stealing and using the sword seemed.

Another line of soldiers from the Garrison appeared, reminding him of something he’d refused to consider.  The Garrison – Merlin’s army – was only 200’000 strong.  Most of them were highly-trained soldiers, backed up by combat magicians and sorcerers, but their numbers were very limited.  Merlin hadn’t needed a large army, or so he’d told his advisers, and he’d never ordered the Garrison expanded.  It had made sense, at the time, but Merlin was gone.  And the noblemen – and even some of the free cities – had far larger armies of private guardsmen under their control.  They’d never posed any threat to Merlin, not when he’d been able to destroy an entire army with a wave of his hand.  And now Merlin was gone and those private armies would far outnumber the forces the central government could deploy in a hurry.  He remembered the nobles he’d met over the years, the ones who would do anything to squeeze an extra glimmer of influence and power out of Merlin, and shuddered.  How long would it take them to realise that they could take power for themselves?

And then there would be civil war.  The free cities would rise against the nobles.  Magicians would start trying to carve out empires for themselves.  And then…

Robin swore, out loud.  Several people glanced at him in surprise; they rarely heard Knights swear, even ones who weren't of the Round Table.  He barked a command at the nearest Troop Commander – no other Knights of the Round Table had appeared, much to his surprise – and started to run, leaving the poor man behind to take command.  It was only a few hundred meters to Beneficence, yet now – with wounded and recovery crews everywhere – it took him time to push his way through the crowd.  The Great College was right in front of him as he ran through the gates and into the grounds…

The iron cage was empty.  Robin reacted without thinking, drawing Excalibur and holding the sword out in front of him.  The Elf had escaped, which meant…trouble, real trouble.  Merlin had created the cage himself, crafting it out of cold iron, but it hadn’t been stable.  Merlin’s departure had broken the spells and the cage had weakened, enough to allow the Elf – stronger than an average human, and far more willing to absorb pain – to free himself.  Robin walked forwards slowly, drawn by instincts he vaguely realised were being driven by the sword, and stopped in horror.  In a shrouded garden, one used by young lovers, he found a scene out of nightmares.  A dozen young students had been ripped apart, their wands broken and snapped on the grass; the remains of their bodies had mangled and woven together by dark magic.  Their eyes were still alive and haunted, endlessly suffering in pain.

Robin swung with Excalibur and the shimmering sword cut right through the warped flesh and bone.  He sensed their souls departing, freed from the Elf’s parting atrocity, and smiled, before he looked around for the Elf.  His instincts – and Excalibur – told him that the Elf was long gone.  Elves were unburdened by puny human concerns; given a head start, an Elf could be halfway across the country before a human even covered a mile.  This one would have ample time to make it to the nearest patch of Greenwood, and Avalon.

And then all hell would break lose.  The Elves had hated Merlin, but they’d feared him.

And now Merlin was gone.

Chapter Ten

The Keep had none of the elegance that had marked the Iron Palace, or the understated arrogance of the Houses of Parliament.  It was a blocky ugly building, occupying one corner of the Iron Triangle, housing the countless clerks who kept the Empire running.  Tiffany had spent more time than she cared to remember in the Keep, trying to cope with an endless series of minor crisis points that threatened to upset the Empire; now, the blocky solidity of the Keep seemed almost reassuring, as if it would provide shelter from the trying times to come.

She stood at the window, hands clasped behind her, staring down into Camelot.  The streets were packed with citizens, some helping with the recovery efforts at the Iron Palace, others merely coming to gawk at the remains.  The news would have spread all over the world by now; Merlin, the man who had effortlessly dominated the Empire, was gone.  Who knew what was going to happen next?  She lifted her eyes, looking towards the south, towards the undefended edges of the city.  Camelot had no walls, not even a single structure marking the edge of the city.  Who would have dared to attack Merlin’s capital city, knowing that the near-omnipotent sorcerer could have destroyed any attackers with a wave of his hand?  It was the only major city in the Empire, ruled by lords or commoners, that had no walls.

Behind her, the Privy Council was slowly gathering in the chamber.  Tiffany didn't want to turn and face them, but there was no choice.  At least the Keep hadn't been packed into a multitude of pocket dimensions, kept in place by Merlin’s will.  The government would have a stable base of operations while it struggled to shape the coming weeks and months.  Everyone was too shocked to move now – watching the Iron Palace fall had probably reminded the courtiers that nothing was permanent – but Tiffany had no illusions as to how long it would last.  Someone, sooner rather than later, would try to push the Privy Council.  And then God alone knew what would happen.

Damn you, she thought, in the privacy of her own mind.  Merlin would not have appreciated her swearing at him out load – and rumour claimed that he heard every time his name was mentioned.  The ring on her finger was still dead and cold, a grim reminder of what she’d lost.  Did you know that you were leaving us?  Why didn't you tell us?

Merlin hadn't really been a friend; he’d had few friends, and most of them had died off in the years since King Arthur had died.  He’d once told her that he’d granted the last of the original Knights of the Round Table a form of immortality, but the Knight had finally come to him and begged to be allowed to die.  Merlin had released the spell, watched his old friend crumble into dust, and then seemed to turn away from friendship.  Tiffany had tried to talk to him from time to time, just to see if he would open up to her, but he’d been reluctant to talk.  She’d eventually realised that she would grow older, have children and eventually die – while Merlin would go on forever.  He wouldn't want to keep burying and mourning his friends.

A cough from behind her caught her attention and she turned around, her gaze flickering over the gathered faces.  The War Room was large enough to house over a hundred men, but she’d only invited the Privy Council – and Robin – to this meeting.  They were seated around the WorldEye, the device that Merlin had created for his servants, a device that was now nothing more than dead stone.  Some of the devices held within the Keep had their own supplies of magic, or could be charged by other magicians, but most of them had drawn on Merlin’s endless power.  Tiffany – now blessed with hindsight – cursed that oversight.  Without Merlin, the Keep had been crippled, rendered nearly blind and deaf.  There weren't even any contingency plans to cope with such an emergency.

She stepped forward and stopped in front of the chairperson’s seat.  It had occurred to her that the Privy Council was composed of experienced men and women, all with their own field of responsibility – and her.  She had been charged with chairing the meetings and, when necessary, speaking with Merlin’s voice.  What was she, she asked herself, without Merlin?  Her sense of duty told her to keep going, yet her position was incredibly weak.  The entire Council’s position was weak.

The chair – hewn from solid stone – felt cold as she sat down and placed her arms on the table, trying for a nonchalance she didn't feel.  They regarded her, their faces as stricken by shock as her own; their entire world had been turned upside down, in the space of a single terrifying hour.  Merlin had had a good eye for loyalty – and competence – and he’d trusted the Privy Councillors.  Tiffany could do no less, even without Merlin.  She’d just have to keep going and hope that it all fell into place.

They were all her political allies, if not her friends.  Major General Sir Valiant, a big bluff man with a long ginger beard, the Master of the Garrison and – effectively – the senior Knight of the Round Table.  He was known for quiet competence, if not imagination, and could be trusted to watch her back.  Merlin had appointed him four years before Tiffany had graduated from Beneficence and told her, in confidence, that Sir Valiant’s only flaw was a willingness to consider violence as the first and last resort.  Tiffany had thought that that was a little hypocritical, at first, but she’d kept that thought to herself.  

Lord Chancellor Rupert was a thin man, with a very pale face and pinched cheeks, topped by the monkish tonsure of dark hair.  The Master of the Imperial Treasury was scrupulously honest, although his iron regard for tax laws and a complete unwillingness to either take bribes or use his position to enrich himself had made him a fair number of enemies.  Tiffany had endured many hours of listening to him droning on about the latest modification to the tax laws, and quarrelling with him over the operational budget for the Empire.  Merlin had written a fairly simple tax code, back when he’d assumed the throne, but a thousand years of clerkship had turned it into a complicated nightmare.

Eleanor, sitting next to him, was a complete contrast to the thin bureaucrat.  She was tall, the tallest woman that Tiffany had ever seen, wearing nothing more than a belt of dragon skin and a single necklace.  Her bare breasts bobbled invitingly every time she spoke, but the complex tattoos covering her body warned men to keep their distance.  Eleanor was a Dragon Mistress, bonded with one of the dragons that allowed Merlin’s armies unquestioned command of the air – and her dragonish partner would go berserk if anyone threatened his rider.  Eleanor wore a sword at her belt, but her real power lay in her link to her dragon.  No one wanted an angry dragon after him.

Aylia sat next to her, dressed rather more conservatively in a long brown dress.  The Mistress of Beneficence College and Lady Librarian of Camelot had been invited onto the council after Tiffany had become Merlin’s First Councillor, leading some to wonder if she’d displayed favouritism.  She hadn’t; it had been Merlin who’d selected her, for reasons that he’d never bothered to share with Tiffany.  Tiffany had wondered if he’d thought that she needed a friend, but then – the Mistress had considerable influence over all of the magical colleges.  And her knowledge of the Empire’s history, geography and culture was extensive.

Tiffany frowned as Baron Blackley, Lord Chief Minister of Justice, tapped his fingers impatiently.  Baron Blackley and her had clashed many times, most recently over the arrest and imprisonment of Duke Blackrock.  The Baron had no love for the Duke and had suggested that she merely execute him personally – or he would happily do it for her – without regard for the political consequences.  He considered her a weakling, she knew, and wouldn't hesitate to speak out against her if he thought that she was doing the wrong thing.  His bushy eyebrows kept tracking towards Robin, who was standing by the door; he didn't quite believe that Robin had such a powerful sword at his belt.  He kept stroking his dark beard compulsively.

Finally, seated opposite Baron Blackley, the High Magus watched her with calm, knowing eyes.  The High Magus was a sorcerer, one of the few to embrace the transition from wizard to sorcerer without killing himself or going mad with power.  With Merlin gone, he was almost certainly the most powerful magician left in the Empire, dominating the House of Magus with a combination of powerful magic and an unbending personality that refused to bow to threats or even darkest magic.  He was tall, inhumanly thin, with long pale fingers and a shaved head.  Power seemed to crackle around him.  It had always been there, but as long as Merlin’s power infused the city, it had been hard to sense anyone else.  Now...Tiffany kept her face expressionless, even though her emotions were churning inside.  No one rose to become a sorcerer without making some...questionable decisions, or even more questionable bargains, and sorcerers had only been kept in check by Merlin.  Without him...

She pushed the thought aside as she leaned forward, catching and holding their attention.  Merlin had taught her that if she acted as if she was in charge – and she knew what she was doing – she could get away with almost anything.  She wasn't sure about the former, and she knew she didn't know the latter, but it seemed to work.  Or perhaps they were just so desperate for normality – of whatever kind – that they were inclined to accept her without question.

“The Empire has seen bad days before,” she said, calmly.  It was true, although the worst the Empire had faced had never included the death – or disappearance – of the near-omnipotent sorcerer who’d ruled them all.  “Merlin has gone, but he appointed us to handle the day-to-day running of the Empire.  We will carry out our duty or die trying.”

She switched her gaze to Sir Valiant.  At least he wouldn't be considering trying to overthrow her.  “What’s the latest report from...from the Iron Palace?”

Sir Valiant spoke slowly, deliberately.  “There were over three thousand people in the palace when Merlin...ah, departed,” he said.  His voice had an edge, suggesting that he was being pushed right to the limit.  “Four hundred and seventy-two people were killed when the palace collapsed, or injured too badly for the healers to save them.  An additional two hundred and nineteen were wounded and are receiving treatment now.  I’ve brought in a couple of additional maniples from outlying garrisons and assigned them to help with the recovery effort.  I do not believe, however, that we will find many more survivors.”

Tiffany nodded.  She’d expected as much.  The Iron Palace had been huge, with passages wandering in and out of the mundane world.  Hundreds of people could have been crushed out of existence, without anyone ever realising that they were gone.

“So far, we’ve had no trouble reported from any of the other garrisons, but that will change,” the burly soldier continued.  His thoughts had run along the same lines as hers, and Robin’s.  They’d lost Merlin – and without him, the Garrison was badly outnumbered.  “There's another piece of bad news.”

Tiffany wanted to rub her eyes, but she made herself sit upright.  Robin had told her, just before the meeting had begun, that the captured Elf Merlin had imprisoned and tortured for laughs had vanished, after slaughtering a handful of student wizards.  The Elves...she didn't want to think about what might happen if the Elves decided to reclaim their ancient lands, the ones Merlin had driven them off centuries ago.  And the Elves might not even be the worst problem.  There were thousands of creatures in Avalon, from the relatively harmless Brownies to the Faerie and the Old Gods.  It had been Merlin who had confined them to the Greenwood, and Avalon.  How many of them would seek to return to the fixed lands?

Sir Valiant didn't try to sugar-coat the bad news.  “The Armoury is gone,” he said, flatly.  “There’s nothing there now, but an empty space.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’s not gone,” the High Magus said, languidly.  “We just don’t know where it is, at the moment.”

Tiffany swallowed an urge to swear aloud, using words that would have made her mother faint.  The Armoury hadn’t been a standard pocket dimension, but a place somewhere far away, linked to Camelot through Merlin’s power.  It had stored all the Objects of Power the Knights of the Round Table had gathered over the years, from objects that were relatively harmless to objects that were so terrifyingly lethal that they were legends in their own right  The Armoury had made a useful club to threaten the occasional rebellious lord, a reminder that Merlin didn't have to draw on his full power to destroy them.  And no one had known where the Armoury was located.  It had been part of its mystique.

And now it had come back to bite them, hard.

“That is little use,” Baron Blackley snapped, icily.  He was one of the few who would dare speak rudely to a sorcerer.  “We need to recover those Objects of Power before someone else gets their hands on them.”

The High Magus made a show of placing his fingertips together, leaning back in his chair.  “The Armoury was never just a pocket dimension,” he said, easily.  “It was a place in our world, bound to Camelot by Merlin’s power.  The Armoury is still there; we've just lost the link that bound it to us.  We never knew where it was in the world.  Merlin never saw fit to share that knowledge with us.”

“We could search for it,” Eleanor said.  She crossed her arms underneath her breasts, pushing them up at the High Magus.  It was a taunt; powerful sorcerers preferred to remain celibate.  Certainly, Tiffany had never heard of Merlin having lovers, let alone children.  “The world isn't that large...”

“A cache of Objects of Power, concealed by the most powerful magician who ever lived,” the High Magus sneered.  If he was touched by her display, he didn't show it.  “It would be hard to find and harder to enter...”

“Unless the spells guarding it have fallen as well,” Eleanor pointed out.  She stuck her tongue out, mischievously.  “We could look...”

“There’s no harm in looking,” Tiffany agreed.

“There is a potentially more serious problem,” Aylia said.  “The boundary lines.  Merlin created them and anchored them in the local Lines of Power, but they won’t last forever without him.  The Greenwood might start to expand again, at terrifying speed.”

There was a long moment of silence, their thoughts elsewhere.  The Greenwood housed the wild magic – and the creatures it had warped and twisted over the centuries.  The thought of all of them bursting out to reclaim lands Merlin had protected from them was terrifying.  There was a patch of Greenwood only thirty miles to the south of Camelot.

The discussion ranged from subject to subject, all avoiding the elephant in the room.  Merlin had created the government, but he’d been its linchpin.  There was very little linking the Privy Council to the Houses of Parliament – or, for that matter, the Garrison to the Iron Triangle.  Could the clerks still collect taxes without Merlin?  What could they do if the Lords and Commons refused to pay?

“There is an issue we should discuss,” Sir Valiant said, finally.  He nodded towards Robin, who was still leaning against the wall, waiting.  “Excalibur has returned to our lands, just before our Emperor...departs.  I believe that there is a connection between the two events.  Merlin always told us that he was holding the Empire in trust for Arthur, when he returned.  I believe that the sword Excalibur knows its rightful master.”

Robin started, shocked.  “I am not King Arthur!”

“People have been allowed to reincarnate before,” Sir Valiant pointed out.  “And we were told that Arthur would return one day.”

“Absurd,” Tiffany said, with more heat than she’d intended.

“People are already whispering that King Arthur has returned,” Lord Chancellor Rupert said.  “And your future husband carries his sword.”

Tiffany stared at him, genuinely shocked.  She worried that Merlin would take offense at Robin holding the sword, but it honestly hadn't occurred to her that Robin might be the reincarnation of King Arthur.  The thought was horrifying, even though it might serve a useful purpose.  The land needed someone to serve as linchpin, but Robin...

“The legends refer to King Arthur sleeping under a hill, until the land needs him,” Aylia snapped.  Her words quietening the growing stir in the room.  “No legend refers to him being reincarnated.”

“Legend are legends,” Eleanor said.  She held up a hand as Tiffany glared at her.  “I don’t mean to imply that Robin actually is King Arthur, but we could use the thought he might be as a rallying point...”

“No,” the High Magus said, a moment before Tiffany could object.  “Names have power, and that name is tied into the very shape of the land.  Invoking it falsely would cost us dearly.”

“We won’t discuss the possibility,” Tiffany agreed.  She exchanged a long glance with Robin.  He looked relieved, rather than angry.  Kingship wouldn't suit him.  “I believe that we should refrain from outright lies...”

“I’d suggest announcing your marriage and setting a date,” Aylia said.  She frowned, thoughtfully.  “It might concentrate a few minds.”

Tiffany opened her mouth to protest that her marriage was not a political event, but stopped, considering.  It might provide enough of a distraction – combined with the threat of Excalibur – to allow the Privy Council a chance to consolidate its power and build new alliances that would prevent outright civil war.  Robin’s warnings about the Dark Sorcerers could not be dismissed, on top of all the other threats.

“Very well,” she said, rising to her feet.  “I will announce the date in front of Parliament, as tradition demands.  That should give us enough time to get ready.”

“Ready,” Rupert repeated.  “Ready for what?”

“For anything,” Tiffany snapped.  “Everyone is too shocked to act now, but how long will it be before someone decides to test the waters?  We’re powerless – and it won’t be long before someone realises that they can just take us...

“And when that happens, we’d better be ready.”

On that note, she – and Robin – swept out of the chamber, leaving the others alone.

Chapter Eleven

Lucas staggered, feeling his chest heaving desperately.  It felt as if he was about to be violently sick, right in front of his father and some of his most trusted servants.  He swallowed hard, feeling the nausea slowly recede.  His father wouldn't appreciate a show of weakness, not by his Heir.  A Heir could never show weakness, for the Court had a very long memory.  Who knew what enemy would be heartened by seeing Lucas in such desperate straits?

“Come along, boy,” his father said, coolly.  If he was affected by the shock of teleporting several hundred miles in a split second, he showed no sign of it.  Lucas carefully kept his resentment off his face.  They could have ridden to Camelot, or even taken the nearest railway line, and it wouldn't have taken them that long.  “We don’t have time to waste.”

Lucas scowled as his father nodded to the wizards who’d prepared and powered the teleport spell.  Sorcerers could teleport on their own, without the need for complex spells, but wizards and mundane humans – and Lucas had never been allowed to develop his scant magical talent – required the spells, and anchors to hold the spells in place.  The experience was thoroughly unpleasant and most sane people preferred to ignore it.  In the wake of Merlin’s disappearance – or death, although rumour seemed unsure of the truth – his father had wanted to reach Camelot as soon as possible.  The whole balance of power between the lords, commoners and magicians was up for grabs.

He followed his father through the door and into the mansion proper.  Anyone who was anyone in High Society had a mansion and servants in Camelot, even if they preferred to pay their homage to Merlin and his allies from a safe distance.  His father had, naturally, one of the biggest and best mansions in the city, although he'd been careful not to outshine the Iron Palace.  Sorcerers could be touchy when they thought someone was trying to outshine them and Merlin was no exception, even though the Iron Palace had collapsed into a pile of rubble.

“You won’t be dining with Lady Blackrock in four days,” his father informed him, as he walked onwards.  He didn't care if the servants overhead him speaking so dismissively to his son; after all, they’d been spelled to be loyal and obedient – and keep everything they overheard to themselves.  “You’ll dine with her tonight and attempt to forge a relationship.”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said, quietly.  There was no point in arguing.  His father would have him try to marry the Heir to Tara, knowing that without Merlin, the Dukes were suddenly the most powerful elements left in the Empire.  The government, without Merlin, was likely to melt away sooner rather than later, leaving a vacuum that the Duke intended to fill.  Lucas risked asking a question, hoping that his father would choose to answer.  “Do you not feel that it would be wise to keep our distance from the Blackrock Family?”

“The sooner I get you married off to someone suitable and raising kids, the better,” his father growled.  He sounded irked, but Lucas had had enough practice with reading his moods to know that he was quietly amused at his son’s naivety.  “There is no room for doubt or scruples in the service of the family, son; our power and position are all that matter.  Do you really feel that any of the others would hesitate before making an alliance with a disgraced family?”

He smiled darkly, ticking points off with his fingers.  “Who is going to strip the Blackrock Family of their wealth and power?”  He asked, mockingly.  “Who is going to tell Duchess Blackrock that she cannot use the wealth of her family?  And even if the Privy Council tries...well, the House of Lords would never let them get away with it.  It would be a clear threat to the rest of the aristocracy.”

Lucas swallowed, hard.  He knew what Duke Blackrock had been doing before he’d been arrested and it sickened him.  His victims might have been only commoners...but there were limits.  He knew that his father had played his own little games, bedding hundreds of commoner wenches just because he could, yet he’d never touched a child.  Lucas himself had had his fun with the servants, as was expected of a male child of the aristocracy, but he too had never touched a child.  And Duke Blackrock hadn’t even been trying to enhance his magical powers.  He’d only been indulging his perverted tastes.

“No, the Blackrock Family will not be touched,” his father continued.  “And that makes them powerful allies.  And that means that no one will dare to push them too hard, even that damned Cromwell and his bunch of so-called Reformists.  Do they not think that we can't recognise the signs of a power grab in the making?”

His study in Camelot was an exact duplicate of the one in his castle, even down to the paintings on the walls.  Lucas had thrilled to the paintings in the past, for they covered the lives of his ancestors, from the great Sir Lancelot to Sir Richard, who’d commanded one of Merlin’s armies in the Serpent Wars.  The latter was depicted as riding on a dragon, sword held high, as he led the charge that broke the defenders of one of the many fortresses that had defended the great western continent.  Afterwards, they’d discovered that the remains of the city’s population had been sacrificed to fuel the dark magic unleashed by the Serpent Empire’s sorcerers.  And after that, Merlin had unleashed his power and shattered the heart of the Serpent Empire.  There was nothing left there now, but a handful of islands populated by magic-warped mutants.  Lucas had once dreamed of being like Sir Richard, yet his father had refused to allow him to serve as a Knight.  The Heir could not be risked in combat.

“Without Merlin, the aristocracy will come into its own,” his father said, as he bellowed a command at a servant girl to bring wind and pasties.  “Merlin understood that we were born to rule, that we were gifted with the right to command our peasants and use them as we saw fit.  We can take control of the Empire and ensure that jumped-up peasants and tradesmen are kept firmly away from the leavers of power.”

Lucas took one of the glasses of wine, careful to only sip at it.  His father’s rage was understandable, in a way; the aristocracy had suffered a considerable lose of power and influence when Merlin had started issuing charters to the free cities.  The more discontented peasants, influenced by tales of lives of freedom and lower taxes, had a nasty habit of deserting their towns and villages and making their way to the free cities, where they could work without noblemen taking most of their produce.  Many of the lords – including his father – worked hard to keep the peasants in their place; loyal, hard-working and ignorant.  A knowledgeable peasant was a dangerous peasant.  It didn’t stop hundreds from fleeing the land each year.

He frowned, thoughtfully.  Lady Tiffany had come up with a novel solution to the problem of reduced manpower.  She’d actually started paying the common-born scrum to work.  His father had been apocalyptic when he’d heard the news, believing – not without reason – that eventually his peasants would demand to be paid too, or they’d simply leave and go to the free cities.  Lucas could see the sense in the idea.  The peasants didn't have to be paid too handsomely.  All they’d really need was a reduction in taxes.  His father had refused to even consider the idea.

“So we’re going to be building a coalition,” his father informed him, finally.  “And you, my son, are going to help me gain control of the entire Empire.”

His eyes gleamed with a dark passion.  He’d never dreamed that he’d have a chance to take complete control, not until Merlin had...departed.  There had always been limits on how far the aristocracy could push their demands under Merlin, but now those limits were gone.  A person with courage and cunning – and his father didn't lack for either, which was why he still sat on the Dukedom’s Throne – could take the entire Empire before everyone else had even realised that the rules had changed.

“Sit back and watch,” his father said.  Lucas knew what he meant; he wanted someone to gloat to, someone who had to be loyal.  “You’ll see a master at work.”

***
The next five hours passed slowly.  Lucas would have preferred to go to one of the local taverns and drink himself senseless, or hunt up one of his noble-born friends and visit the nearest brothel, but his father refused to even let him consider leaving the chamber.  A session of dignities, from lesser noblemen to representatives from two of the other Dukes, filed through the room, bargaining with his father.  They all shared the shocked expression that suggested that their world had turned upside down – and that they didn't know what to do.  His father was more than happy to provide suggestions.

Lucas had had plenty of practice at pretending to pay attention while he allowed his mind to wander and this was no different.  It helped that his father didn't expect him to actually contribute, merely listen carefully.  His magical talent was very limited – he had no reason to expect to become a wizard, even if his father had allowed him to train with private tutors – and he hadn't really been aware of Merlin’s presence until it had vanished, as if the immortal sorcerer had snapped his fingers and dropped dead.  It made little sense and the lies his father was spreading, suggesting that Merlin hadn't really been immortal after all, made even less sense.  No one could gaze down upon Merlin’s Rage, the remains of the Serpent Empire, without knowing that Merlin had effortlessly channelled power that would be beyond even the capabilities of a hundred sorcerers.

And yet...  “Confidence is the key to running a kingdom,” his father had said, in one of his more expansive moods.  “If you act hesitant, as if you don’t have the right to do whatever you are doing, you will be questioned.  Act like you own the place and you can steal everything they have before they realise that something is badly wrong.”

He pushed the thought aside as another serving girl entered the chamber.  It pleased his father to take commoner-born girls from their families, enforce their loyalty with carefully-tuned spells, and then add them to his army of servants.  This one had shown considerable promise and his father had arranged for her to be trained in running a large household, freeing up time for his own schemes.  Lucas half-smiled, remembering one evening a year ago when he’d summoned her to his bed, before straightening upright.  Something was badly wrong.

“You have a guest, master,” the girl said.  Her eyes were blank, lifeless.  “You have a guest, master.  You have a guest, master.  You have a guest...”

“Shut up,” Duke Valditch snapped.  The girl ignored him, repeating the same phase time and time again.  A dark stain had appeared in her garments, suggesting that she’d lost control of her bladder.  Lucas stared, horrified.  His father seemed much more composed.

“You destroyed the mind of one of my servants,” he said, coldly.  He seemed to be addressing the empty air.  “Come into the open and we will talk.”

Lucas reached for his sword as a man appeared out of nowhere.  He was tall and thin, with a handsome face, but the pose of a much older man.  His tunic was Sorcerer’s Black, a darkness so profound that it seemed to suck in all of the ambient light in the chamber.  Lucas half-drew his sword, only to be halted by a gesture from his father.  He couldn't hope to prevail against a sorcerer.

His father showed no sign of concern, or fear.  “She was one of my people,” he said, nodding to the servant girl.  She was still hopelessly repeating her message.  “I assume you wanted my attention?”

“Of course, father,” the sorcerer said.  His voice was light and breathy.  “Did you like watching her stand before you, little more than a puppet to one with superior will?”

Lucas stared.  Father?  How could the sorcerer be his brother?  But then, his father had raised hundreds of illegitimate children, hoping that cross-breeding his aristocratic blood – stretching back over a thousand years – with commoners would give some of the children an enhanced command of magic.  It was risky – the Tribunal would have taken a dim view of an unauthorised breeding program, if it had caught wind of the project – but his father had few doubts and less scruples.  A cadre of trained magicians, unknown to the wider world, could be very handy to a man who wanted to secure and enhance his own position.

“You gained new powers then,” his father said.  A new edge entered his voice.  “You are aware, of course, that such tricks will not work on your brother, or me?”

“You have warded yourselves thoroughly,” the sorcerer said.  “And yet, are you confident in those wards?”

“You were sent to become a sorcerer,” his father said, ignoring the question.  Lucas wished he felt as confident.  Sorcerers were dangerously powerful – and his half-brother looked more dangerous than most.  “I assume that your master succeeded in keeping his word?”

“He has accomplished something great,” the sorcerer agreed.  “I stand before you as his representative, the Sorcerer Shade.  My master wishes to discuss an alliance with you.”

Lucas’s father leaned forward.  “An alliance?”

“My master is aware of your plans to take Merlin’s place,” Shade said.  His voice seemed cool and calculating, but Lucas was uneasily aware that he could be weaving all manner of charms into his words.  “You must realise that the magical force you have at your disposal is insufficient to claim power for yourself?  Others will rise to oppose you, led by the High Magus.  Your plan is doomed to failure.”

“So you say,” Lucas’s father said.  He seemed unworried by the claim.  “And you believe that you can help me?”

“My master wishes to share power with you,” Shade informed him.  “He does not wish to rule the world, but merely to enhance his own powers and control over the magical world.  You may have the remainder of the Empire, if you work with him now.”

Lucas started.  He spoke before he could stop himself.  “Work with a Dark Sorcerer?”

His father said nothing, merely smiled.  Lucas almost swore aloud.  His father hadn't needed Sir Robin to tell him what had happened to the dead villagers; he’d always known.  If he’d sent Shade to the Dark Sorcerers, hoping that he’d become a sorcerer loyal to his father, he might well have traded a hundred peasants for Shade’s training.  And when Sir Robin had arrived at his castle, he must have wondered if Merlin had suspected the truth.

“My master is offering you the world,” his half-brother said, turning to face him.  Up close, it was easier to see the family resemblance, although there was something...not quite right about his brother’s face.  Dark sorcery came with a price and the price was often physical and mental decay.  “Do you not think that that is worth working with him?”

“The Privy Council cannot hold onto power,” his father said, slowly.  He took no notice of Lucas’s concerns.  “If you weaken it to the point where we can take control without a bloodbath...”

“You will rule the land,” Shade agreed.  “And as long as you keep your side of the bargain, we will keep ours.”

He lifted one hand in ironic salute – and was gone.  His puppet, the serving girl, collapsed as if her strings had been touched.  Lucas felt a flicker of cold terror as he reached down and touched the girl’s forehead.  Her body was still warm and breathing, but her mind was long gone.  There was literally no one at home.

His father seemed unmoved, summoning two of his other servants.  “Dispose of that,” he ordered, “and then have Master Boyle sent to me.  I want to know how he was able to walk through our defences so easily...”

Lucas had never tried to argue with his father before, but he felt as if he had no choice.

“Father,” he said, slowly, “is it wise to make a deal with the Dark Sorcerers?”

His father lifted a single elegant eyebrow.  “You propose to question my decision?”

Lucas swallowed, but pressed on regardless.  “They’re not sane,” he protested.  “You can’t trust them to keep any bargain...”

“Of course they’re not sane,” his father agreed, without visible emotion.  “But then, that very insanity is often their greatest weakness.  We can use them to spread chaos, weakening the Privy Council, while holding out the promise of allowing them dominion over magic and magicians – and when the time comes, we remove them and ensure that they no longer pose a threat to us.”

“You intend to kill a group that even Merlin couldn't eradicate,” Lucas said.  Fear, oddly, had granted him a certain level of bravery.  He’d never stood up to his father so openly before, even when his father had beaten him as a young man.  “What happens if they turn on us first?”

His father smiled.  “I’ve met his master, dealt with him,” he said.  “I know how he thinks.  We can hold out the promise of vast power long enough to take control, reassert control of the Garrison and the Colleges of Magic, and then turn on them.  If they were so insane as to pose an irrational danger, to turn on us for no sane reason, they’d have destroyed themselves by now.  Dark sorcerers are sane enough to know where their best interests lie.”

Lucas frowned.  “And if you’re wrong?”

His father shrugged, and then smiled.  “You will take my place,” he said, finally.  “In the end, it’s all about the family.  The family comes first, always.”

Chapter Twelve

The Houses of Parliament had impressed Lord Mayor Thomas Cromwell when he’d first seen them, even though he’d understood that true power had always resided inside the Iron Palace.  The three Houses of Parliament formed a smaller triangle at the tip of the Iron Triangle, surrounded by gardens that had been beautifully landscaped – before they’d been turned into emergency housing for the wounded from the Iron Palace.  The MPs – the Lords, the Commons and the magicians who formed the House of Magus – waited, as tradition demanded, on the greenery, waiting for the doors to open.

Thomas openly looked around, moving from face to face.  The other politicians were doing the same thing, for the same reason.  They were counting friends and allies, enemies and neutrals, people who might help or hinder their factions in the coming power struggle.  The Lords, with their bright garish robes, kept a polite distance from the Commons, who wore basic overalls and sashes of office.  Many of the MPs from the House of Commons were richer and more influential than most of the minor nobility, a fact that didn't stop the Lords looking down on them in public.  In private, the minor nobility were often willing to deal; indeed, Thomas had been offered a chance to marry his son to the daughter of an earl, knowing that his descendents would have a title and a guaranteed place in the House of Lords.  And all it would have cost him would have been a few hundred thousand crowns.

He’d dismissed the offer, after careful consideration.  His father had been a farmer, a serf working the fields belonging to his local lord.  After several years of watching all of his produce – apart from a bare minimum – confiscated and sold by the nobility, his father had taken his wife and infant child and walked out of the noble lands, into the free city of Londinium.  It had been risky – his lord would have had him whipped if he’d caught him trying to escape – but he’d made it.  The free city was hardly a paradise, yet he’d survived and prospered – and his son had become Lord Mayor, and the city’s representative to the House of Commons.  Thomas Cromwell, the effective leader of the Reform Faction in Parliament, was hardly about to betray his father by claiming a noble title for himself.

Merlin had originally set up the Houses of Parliament to provide representation for the citizens of the Pendragon Empire.  Over the years, they had developed political factions, from the Conservatives – heavily backed by the aristocracy – to the Reform Faction, who drew their support from the free cities.  Reform had been growing more powerful lately as the subtle conflict between the free cities and the aristocracy had been starting to break out into the open, with both sides seeking ways to inflict harm on the other.  The Lords had been raising the prices of foodstuffs for the free cities, trying to make the population hungry and more tractable; the free cities had been refusing to sell the Lords the manufactured goods that they needed for their farms.  With the House of Magus consumed by internal politics, as always, the struggle had been growing more and more intractable.  And now, without Merlin, it might break into open war.

Like everyone else with political ambitions, Thomas had his agents scattered through Camelot and the other political factions.  It hadn't been hard to track the thousands of private guards the aristocracy had been shipping into the city, a move that was not – technically – illegal, if only because an entire army couldn't stand against Merlin.  The common-born were not entitled to private armies of their own, but Thomas and his allies had been fiddling with the technicalities and transported in a large force of City Guardsmen.  No one wanted a bloodbath, yet everyone was uneasily aware that everyone else was preparing for war.

He looked over at a pair of sorcerers, screaming insults and threats at each other, and started to wander away towards the other side of the gardens.  Merlin had designed the House of Magus to give the Empire’s magicians a voice in its politics – and distract those who wanted to play political games.  There were two hundred magicians in the House of Magus, magicians who had won their seats by the simple expedient of killing or intimidating the last holder.   They spent most of their time fighting each other, but now that Merlin was gone...

The magicians have powers far beyond those of mundane men, he thought, as the two sorcerers started throwing magic spells at each other.  They would never have dared fight when Merlin was alive, not when their duel posed a threat to everyone else in the gardens.  Without Merlin, will they seek to take control of the Empire?

A flash of light heralded the arrival of the High Magus, backed up by a pair of combat magicians with long staffs and bad intentions.  The two sorcerers reluctantly separated, although not soon enough to prevent five people from being struck by deflected spells and transformed into animals or small objects.  Thomas knew better than to expect that the sorcerers would be punished, not now that Merlin was gone.  Even the High Magus would have difficulty imposing his will on a mass of angry sorcerers.

He turned as the doors to the House of Lords opened, allowing the waiting crowds a chance to enter the building.  As befitted the senior House of Parliament, the other Houses came and sat in the House of Lords whenever someone – normally Merlin or his First Councillor – chose to speak to all three Houses at once.  The Lords had been swearing for years that they would convince Merlin to change that custom, but they hadn't been able to gain a majority of aristocrats who were prepared to enter the House of Commons.  No one in their right mind – and without substantial magical protection – would enter the House of Magus.

The interior of the building dated from forty years after Merlin had established his rule over England, just before the mighty armies of the Pendragon Empire had set off to conquer Gaul, and then the world.  Each of the Patriarchs – the senior Lords from each noble family – had a individual box, allowing him to sit in state and gaze down upon his social inferiors.  Below them, the lesser nobility would sit, although not all of them chose to attend.  They knew that their votes counted for little if seven of the thirteen Dukes agreed on a course of action.  By long tradition, the Patriarchs controlled the votes of the rest of their families.

Below the lesser nobles – and bitterly resenting it – were the clergy, led by the Archbishop of Canterbury.  The Archbishop was, in theory, second in power to the Pope, who resided in Rome.  In practice, it was whispered by the wags that the Pope was only ever allowed to chose his underwear, with all other decisions made by the Archbishop.  Thomas met his eyes and they exchanged smouldering looks.  The orthodox clergy had made the decision, years ago, to ally themselves with the aristocracy, preaching loyalty, patience and obedience to the peasants, in exchange for hefty tithes.  It hadn't made them popular in the free cities, which allowed dissident clergy to preach, even though it was officially forbidden.  It was yet another faultline that might be about to explode.

Thomas frowned as he made his way towards his own seat, right at the bottom.  The House of Lords wasn't known for being subtle, and while they’d ensured that the magicians received comfortable chairs, they’d given the Commoners hard wooden benches.  It kept them in their place, or so the Lords had been known to claim.  A number of MPs from the Commons normally refused to attend the House of Lords, just on general principles, but today the building was heaving.  Everyone who was entitled to attend – Lords, Commoners and Magicians – had come to the session.

And most of them, he realised, were carrying weapons.  Merlin had forbidden his politicians from carrying weapons, on the theory that bloodstained walls didn't make political discourse any more interesting.  Normally, the MPs were exempt from the Code Duello in any case, but now...without Merlin’s ever-present observation, almost every MP was carrying a weapon.  One misstep and there’d be a bloody slaughter, right at the heart of government.

He took his seat and allowed his eyes to roam freely, starting with the splendidly-dressed Patriarchs in their boxes and roaming down towards his fellow Commoners.  There was an undertone of quiet unease running through the chamber.  Everyone had known where they stood under Merlin; now, without him, who really ran the Empire?  The Lords, with their titles and control of most of the land; the Commoners, with their control over the industries and the source of much of the Empire’s yearly tax revenues...or the Magicians, with the power to crush the other two and establish a new Rule of Magic?

A gong echoed through the chamber and silence fell, drowned out by the waves of magic that shimmered out from the Speaker’s chair.  Merlin had designed the gong himself, ensuring that his trusted servants could use it to make sure that they were heard – and silence their enemies, if necessary.  Now...Thomas Cromwell braced himself.  The world had already turned upside down...and if the session went badly wrong, it would fall down into civil war.

***
Tiffany wore her formal First Councillor gown as little as possible.  It was white, like the robes she wore under normal circumstances, but it was covered with diamonds and magically-enhanced gems that allowed her to draw on additional power – and alarmingly tight in all the right places.  And it took a team of nine maidservants to help her get dressed in the morning, with another team carrying the long white train behind her.  There were times when she wondered, looking at herself in the mirror, if the gown wasn't Merlin’s idea of a practical joke.  She looked as if she was going to a wedding.

As First Councillor – Merlin’s representative to his people – she’d addressed the Houses of Parliament many times before, but she’d often preferred to work behind the scenes.  Facing the best and brightest of the realm – or at least those who had chosen the right parents – could be a nightmarish experience.  Besides, Merlin preferred to work more subtly than merely threatening everyone to get his way, although no one would ever forget that the threat of naked force hung in reserve.  Tiffany, now, knew that there was no longer anything backing her words, but tradition.

The silence grew and lengthened as she made her slow walk down to the podium.  Merlin had clearly designed the House of Lords with an eye to permanence, for the spells that enhanced voice and vision hadn't collapsed when he’d departed from the world.  Or perhaps the team of magicians the High Magus had assigned to providing security had restored the spells on their own, without waiting for orders.  There was no way to know for sure, at least not without asking, but the thought kept her focused as she completed her walk.  The entire Empire – or at least its rulers – hung on her every word.

She wished, suddenly, that Robin had accompanied her to the House of Lords, but he had no right to enter the building, certainly not as her lover and fiancé.  A Knight of the Round Table was only supposed to claim his noble title after retirement, although that rule had been rarely observed in the last five hundred years.  She didn't dare break it herself, not now.  It would raise too many questions.

“Noble Lords, Elected Commoners, Powerful Mages,” she said.  The magic running through the chamber would ensure that they all heard her words.  “Our Lord Merlin, Emperor of the Pendragon Empire, Prince of Enchanters, Lord of the Darkness, Grand Sorcerer of Sorcerers, Grandmaster of Magicians...has chosen to leave us, for a time.  We must govern wisely in his absence.”

The chamber remained silent, although she could almost hear hundreds of minds considering her statement.  No one knew if Merlin had left the world, or died, and that uncertainty would hamper any attempt to take supreme power.  The prospect of someone overthrowing the Privy Council and taking power – and then having to face an angry Merlin when he returned to the fixed lands – wasn't a pleasant one, even to the ambitious.  She’d deliberately listed all of Merlin’s titles to remind them of his power.

She’d asked herself, time and time again, what had happened to Merlin, but she’d never been able to answer the question.  The magicians picking their way through the remains of the Iron Palace hadn't found a body, yet that proved nothing.  Merlin had been a supremely powerful magician and, if he’d died, the last of the magic in his body should have reduced it to dust and ash.  They might never find conclusive proof of what had happened to him, leaving them to draw their own conclusions.  She prayed that the threat of a future return would convince them to avoid rash action.

“There is much to be done in the coming weeks and months,” Tiffany continued.  She’d dispatched several other Knights of the Round Table to the nearest patches of Greenwood, trusting them to check the conditions of the Boundary Lines.  If they were falling, the entire Empire would be in mortal danger.  “We may face a renewed threat from the Elves, from Dark Sorcerers...perhaps even from the creatures contained within the Greenwood.  We must be vigilant and concentrate on our own defence.

“The Privy Council was trusted by Merlin to handle the day-to-day running of the Empire.  We will continue in that role until the Emperor returns and reassumes his powers.  I trust that you will all work towards ensuring that we have a stable and prosperous Empire to present to him when he returns.”

She half-closed her eyes.  The bluff – if it was a bluff – had to be completely convincing.  Given time, the Privy Council could secure its position and ensure that the Empire Merlin had created didn't spiral down into civil war, or fragment into nothing.  And if the Houses of Parliament believed that Merlin would return, one day, they'd be less likely to do something everyone else would come to regret.

“At Merlin’s command, I wish to formally notify you of my marriage to Sir Robin of Loxley, Knight of the Round Table,” she added, a moment later.  The shift would concentrate a few minds on Robin – and the sword he held, despite an official request by the House of Magus that he turn Excalibur over to their custody.  “The wedding will be held in the Summer Palace, two weeks from today.  The Houses of Parliament are, of course, invited.”

She smiled at their confusion.  Tiffany might have been Lady of Shalott, but Shalott was too minor a realm to merit the attention of Dukes and Lords – if she hadn't been Merlin’s First Councillor.  She was required by law to announce the engagement – which they’d done two months ago – and then the date of the wedding to the Houses of Parliament, just so that High Society could prepare for the party.  And, announcing it after Merlin’s departure, it would confuse the hell out of them.  Anything to buy time...besides, a formal wedding party would provide a venue for political discussions, away from the public eye.  It would give them at least two weeks, she hoped, before new alliances firmed up.

“I thank you for your time,” she concluded.  “I look forward to seeing you all at my wedding.”

***
Lucas watched as Tiffany turned and walked towards the great stone doors, the long train of her dress shimmering out behind her.  He was completely confused; she’d told them very little, apart from the date of her marriage.  It didn't hurt, not really. He'd known that she wasn’t interested in him after their first and last meeting.  Lucas had acted like a boor and Tiffany, who’d dealt with someone far more powerful and important than Lucas’s father, hadn't been impressed.

And Merlin might be coming back...

He looked over at his father and received a nasty shock.  His father was smiling, a cold nasty smile that fluttered around the edge of his lips.  Lucas had learned never to trust his father’s smiles, for his father took very little delight in anything that didn't enhance the position of the family.  The House of Lords was starting to buzz with conversation as the doors closed behind Tiffany, with Lords and Commons arguing over what she’d said – and how it affected their plans for the future.  Lucas didn't take his eyes off his father.  If he hadn’t known better, he would have sworn that his father was laughing.

Lucas leaned forward.  “Father?”

The magic in the gilded box kept them from being overhead, but his father spoke quietly anyway.

“She’s weak,” he whispered.  He sounded almost as if he were gloating, although Lucas couldn't see why.  Tiffany had never struck him as weak.  Besides, she’d rejected him, hadn't she?  That wasn't the act of a weak or foolish girl.  “She doesn't have the power to force us to do anything.”

Lucas stared at him.  “But...”

“But nothing,” his father said.  “She raised the spectre of Merlin’s return – but how does she know that he’s going to return?  She raised the spectre of the Elves, of Dark Sorcerers and even the Greenwood...”

His smile grew colder.  “She’s weak,” he repeated.  The cold confidence in his voice shocked Lucas, even though he was used to his father’s moods.  And with the bargains he’d been making ever since Merlin had vanished, he might be right.  “The Privy Council won’t be able to keep control, not for long – certainly not when our new friends start their war.  And then we will be ready.  This whole empire will be ours.”

Chapter Thirteen

“I still don’t see why you’re marrying him.”

Tiffany sighed.  The Dowager Lady Aloha was short, with curly dark hair and a smile that could charm at a thousand paces.  She had certainly charmed the Lord of Shalott – although Tiffany couldn't complain about that, as without her mother Tiffany herself would certainly never have been born.  On the other hand, she had a sneaking suspicion that her mother had married well to improve her station in High Society and her endless attempts to wed Tiffany to a series of well-connected men hadn't helped.  Her mother had seemingly never realised that the title of Shalott ran from generation to generation; her mother couldn't even serve as regent for her young daughter.  And if she married again, she would lose her link to Shalott.

“Because I love him, mother,” Tiffany said, with heavy patience.  She’d coped with threats and anger from the House of Lords, angry protests and denunciations from the House of Commons and sullen anger from the House of Magus.  She could certainly cope with her own mother.  “Robin is a good and decent man.”

“Love?”  Lady Aloha repeated.  “What does love have to do with anything?  People of our exulted station don’t marry for love, not when we have to keep the bloodlines pure...”

“If half of the stories of the original Lady of Shalott are true,” Tiffany pointed out, in the most reasonable voice she could muster, “the bloodline was never pure, even back in the days of King Arthur.”

Her mother scowled at her.  Shalott was hardly Tara, let alone the vast open plains of Tchernobog, but it occupied one of the places where the barriers between Earth and Avalon were very thin, if indeed they were present at all.  Even before Merlin, the Castle of Shalott had been built to provide a barrier between the two dimensions – and the castle’s keeper, a man appointed by King Arthur’s ancestor, had had a Faerie wife.  Their daughter had been cursed by others from Avalon and condemned never to set eyes on a man, until she’d accidentally looked upon Sir Lancelot of the Lake as he rode southwards to Camelot.  Dying, she’d embarked upon a barge and drifted down towards Camelot, dying before she could reach the original castle.  King Arthur had confirmed her sister as the Lady of Shalott in her place, even though others had questioned the wisdom of appointing a half-Faerie to watch over the gateway.

The Pendragon Empire took a dim view of half-breeds, even though Merlin, their ruler, had been a half-breed himself.  Everyone knew that blending human strains with something else produced a strange combination – and some of those hybrids could be extremely dangerous.  Tiffany knew that she had barely any Faerie blood left in her – her ancestors had only bred with fellow humans, unless some of the stranger stories about Great Uncle Oswald were true – but prejudice had never been particularly rational.  Her mother might well be rejected by High Society for giving birth to a hybrid child.

“I only want the best for you, daughter,” her mother said.  The odd thing was that Tiffany believed her, even though she rebelled against her mother’s concept of the best thing in her life.  If she married a senior aristocrat, Shalott might end up subsumed in greater holdings, whatever the marriage contract said.  Her child would combine the title of Lord of Shalott with something more substantial.  “And I do feel that a mere Knight would not suit you...”

Tiffany rounded on her mother angrily.  They’d been engaged for nearly a year and her mother still hadn't abandoned her quest to convince her that Sir Robin wouldn't make a good husband.  She was getting married tomorrow and her mother still hadn’t given up.  In some ways, it was almost welcome, because it provided a distraction from more pressing concerns – or it would be, if she’d had time to deal with it.  No one had tried anything overtly in the two weeks since Merlin had departed – she still refused to consider the possibility that he might be dead – but her finely-tuned political senses were warning her that various parties were jockeying for position.  Sooner or later, someone would cough at the wrong time and someone else would take it as a signal to start something violent.  And then all hell would break loose.

“Mother, the Lady of the Lake gave him Excalibur,” she snapped.  Robin’s possession of the sword had set a great many tongues wagging, with some pointing out that he should be crowned King of England, of not of the whole Empire.  Others had warned of the dangers of someone walking around with a terrifyingly powerful Object of Power and insisted that it be removed and stored in the Armoury.  So far, no one had dared to try to take the sword, which had saved Tiffany from admitting that the Armoury was lost.  She had a sneaking suspicion that only the threat of the Armoury was deterring the more ambitious souls from launching a coup.  “He is worthy.”

“But is he worthy of you, child?” Her mother said.  She leaned forward.  “The Duke of Hastings has a son who was presented at Court last year.  You could break the engagement and...”

“Enough,” Tiffany thundered.  Her mother could probably nag the Lords of Faerie into leaving the human race alone, if she tried.  “I am marrying him, mother, and that is the end of it!”

Her mother snorted, but had the sense to say nothing else.  She’d come from minor nobility – her father’s brother had been an Earl – and she had very little to depend upon.  Traditionally, when a noblewoman married upwards, socially, she cut formal ties with her former family – and if some became haughty and arrogant because they had married well, their former family often refused to have anything to do with them.  Merlin had quietly encouraged the tradition, although Tiffany had never been able to understand why.  It seemed to push the aristocrats into maintaining a fairly stable nobility, but it also kept women in unhappy marriages.

Tiffany signed inwardly.  Tradition also dictated that when a noblewoman married, her mother – or nearest surviving older female relative – took control of the wedding arrangements.  She’d wanted a simple wedding, even though she’d known that it would become a political circus, giving the different factions a chance to plot and scheme – and associate with people they would cut dead if they met them on the streets.  Her mother, if nothing else, would ensure that everything ran smoothly, if only because she’d feel personally humiliated if something went wrong.

She thought, briefly, of Robin.  Wherever he was, standing his final vigil, she hoped that he was having an easier time of it.  At least he had no parents trying to organise his life for him.

Tomorrow, you will be married, she thought, looking down at the wedding dress.  Thankfully, she’d managed to convince her mother not to use any of the more outrageous dresses the designers had offered.  One of them would have barely covered her breasts and thighs; another would have covered everything, leaving only a tiny slit for her eyes.  And tomorrow you will be a bride.

She shook her head.  She’d planned to take a long vacation when they’d married, a honeymoon that took them right around the Empire.  Merlin had kept her close and she’d never set foot outside England; she hadn't even visited Gaul.  Now...now she’d be lucky if she had time to take a few brief hours before they had to return to Camelot.  She hoped that Robin understood.  Her mother had offered little useful advice about men, but her married friends had been happy to share their thoughts with her.  Men...

Smiling, she reached for the dress and started to pull it on.  Her mother and a pair of maidservants caught her arms and helped her to pull it on properly, allowing her to relax and study herself in the mirror.

“You look like a bride, my dear,” the mirror said.  The tiny face someone had carved into the wooden frame smiled, rather unpleasantly.  “And a woman should always look her best on her special day.”

Tiffany scowled at the mirror.  “Who charmed you so you could speak?”

The mirror seemed to flicker, tossing an image back at her she didn't recognise.  Enchanters worked hard to infuse magic and spells into objects, turning them into semi-aware magical devices.  Some of them were fairly mundane, like the mirror; others could be deadly dangerous, or surprising.  Merlin had sometimes crafted devices himself, but most of his counted as Objects of Power.  At least he hadn't created the mirror...

Her mother finished tying up the back of the dress and started to fuss away at the front.  Tiffany sighed and resigned herself to a few wasted hours.  At least the plotting wouldn't become serious until after the wedding.  She’d hoped that it would provide a convenient location for last-minute alliances and, so far, it seemed to have worked.

***
Robin knelt on the hard stone floor of the small church, feeling the cold stone pressing against his knees.  As tradition demanded, he had divested himself of everything, but his undergarments – and Excalibur – before kneeling in front of the alter.  There were no priests or vicars visible, yet there was a sense that he was in the presence of something holy.  He allowed it to soak through his body as he remained still, concentrating on the candle mounted on top of the alter.  It burned steadily.  It had been burning steadily for nearly a thousand years.

You will be tempted, a voice echoed through his head.  His old master, back when he’d been squired after four intensive years of training and drilling at the Garrison.  Each would-be Knight was paired off with a senior Knight and tested extensively.  He still had nightmares about how Sir Young had fired off question after question, often in the midst of battle.  And yet, the old Knight had prepared him well for his vigil.  He remained focused on the candle, waiting for the sun to rise.  It was the first moment he’d had for peace and contemplation since Merlin had left.

His master had warned him that the final vigil – by tradition, only unmarried Knights stood vigils – would be the hardest of all.  He hadn’t exaggerated; Robin’s meditations were constantly disturbed by thoughts of Tiffany, by the thought that once they were wed they could do anything they liked, without social censure.  It was hardly unknown for noblewomen to indulge themselves outside marriage – although it was always a scandal – but Tiffany wasn't that kind of girl.  They’d kissed, and held each other, yet they’d gone no further.  It had left him feeling frustrated, and yet...he’d respected her decision.  There were too many stories of what happened to Knights who lost their...innocence.

The stories echoed through his head, a warning from the past.  Sir Lancelot, once the greatest Knight of the Round Table, had fallen in love with the Queen.  And she’d fallen in love with him.  He’d been forced into rebellion, raised an army against his former master, and eventually lost the final battle.  King Arthur had pardoned him, but Lancelot had never pardoned himself.  He’d hung himself shortly after his defeat, according to some of the legends.  There were darker legends, ones whispered about what had happened after Merlin returned to discover what had become of the First Golden Age.  Lancelot hadn't just been killed, they whispered; he’d been condemned to hell.

Some of the younger stories were darker, in their own way.  Knights had been seduced by Faerie women, weakening to the point where they were stolen into Avalon and never seen again.  Others had weakened themselves to the point where they became vulnerable to attacks from demons and darkest magic, or lost themselves in madness.  The Knights of the Round Table liked to believe that they were incorruptible servants of the Iron Throne, but the truth was often darker.  A handful of Knights had fallen to the darkness over the years.

He breathed slowly, feeling his heartbeat slowing down until it barely echoed in his ears.  Sleep was the great temptation, a threat that forced him to remain alert – or risk nodding off while conducting his vigil.  No one would know, but him, yet failure would always burn away at him, weakening his confidence in himself.  He touched Excalibur – the sword had refused to be left behind, whatever the tradition said – and felt the sword’s energy flowing into him, providing a measure of reassurance.  Sir Robin still felt unworthy.

There hadn't been time for a proper bachelor party – but then, he hadn't really wanted one.  He’d attended two in the past, both for Knights who were on the verge of marriage, and both of them had been rancorous tavern crawls.  One of the Knights, he suspected, had actually lost his virginity to a prostitute hours before he was due to be married.  Certainly, something had happened to call the wedding off.

It’s going to be fine, he told himself, firmly.  He loved Tiffany and she loved him back.  What more did they need?  Tomorrow you will be a husband.

He shifted, slightly, and refocused on the candle.  The vigil would go on.

***
The Summer Palace was a bare two miles from a medium-sized town that housed most of the Palace’s staff.  Merlin had originally envisioned the Summer Palace as a place of quiet contemplation, but when the nobility had started holding their weddings in the building the staff requirements had shot upwards rapidly.  They demanded fancy food, drinks and clothing, each requiring a massive staff.  The town of Waterford had expanded to match.

Maledict strode down the town’s main street, concealed behind a glamour that hid his warped features and glowing eyes from the patrolling soldiers.  Someone was convinced that something was likely to go wrong at the wedding, his spies had told him; the Garrison had moved three maniples – three thousand men – into the vicinity.  Or maybe it was just an attempt to convince the soldiers to remain loyal in Merlin’s absence.  They hadn't bothered to set up wards around the town, let alone the network of smaller villages surrounding the Summer Palace.  They had warded the Summer Palace itself – the original wards had collapsed when Merlin vanished – but it wouldn't be enough to match Merlin’s work.  The larger the area needed to be covered, the less specific and powerful the wards.  It wouldn't be hard for a single determined attack to break through and cut down the most important and powerful people in the Empire.

There was no need for him to undertake the mission himself, but he’d been determined to go and none of his followers had dared object.  Maledict had been...frustrated by the need to remain in hiding, even after Merlin was gone.  He’d wanted to launch an immediate attack on the remains of the government, indulging his men and their sadistic tastes.  Waiting, even for a greater goal, was hard.  Besides, he wanted to amuse himself by walking right through the small army that had been gathered to protect the wedding.  They had no idea that their greatest enemy was right in front of them.

He strode towards a single building, concealing his smile under the glamour.  A thousand artisans had taken up residence in Waterford, producing their finest creations for the wedding.  Like most workshops, it was owned and almost completely operated by a family, with the younger children apprenticed to their elders.  It reminded him of some of the arrangements within his home city, before he’d fled into the darkness and remade himself.  The thought drove him onwards, angrily.  Back home, lucky families had formed a cartel and cut out the unlucky families, leaving them to starve on the streets.

The doorway was solid wood, but it couldn’t have stood up to a hedge witch, let alone a sorcerer.  He looked up at the horseshoe mounted above the door and snorted, before using a simple charm to unlock the door and step inside.  A pair of workers – one barely old enough to grow stubble – started as he entered, and then reached for the clubs they wore at their wrists.  They couldn't have reacted in time to save themselves; Maledict snapped off a quick spell and they froze, helplessly.  A second spell ensured that they would have no memory of his appearance, or their paralysis.

Inside the building, he found the artwork, a set of beautifully carved wooden miniatures.  A pair of serving girls were examining them, unaware of his arrival.  He froze them before they saw him and started to reach into his bag, removing a handful of charmed objects.  It took no more than a few minutes to replace some of the carved objects with the items he’d brought in his bag, followed by a simple charm that would ensure that neither of the girls saw anything odd about the wooden statues.  They’d take them up to the Summer Palace, right through the wards, without suspecting that anything was wrong.

Holding up one hand, he cast a final charm.  It was a subtle piece of work, one he flattered himself was worthy of a fully-trained wizard – and backed with all the power of a sorcerer.  No one would see anything wrong; the charm was so subtle that few magicians would even possess enough of the Sight to perceive its existence.  It helped that it wasn't trying to compel anyone to do anything.  It merely made it impossible for them to see the statues as they really were.

Chuckling to himself, he walked back out of the building and shut the door behind him.  The staff would return to normal without realising that anything had happened; after all, no one had been robbed, murdered or raped.  His smile only grew wider as he walked past a pair of magicians and out towards the countryside.  They never even sensed his presence.

Soon, he promised himself.  He could just make out the blur of light and magic surrounding the Summer Palace.  The wedding itself was set for one hour before noon.  It would never be completed.  Soon you’ll see me as I really am...

Chapter Fourteen

Lucas pulled himself out of bed, ignoring the sleeping body of the serving girl beside him, and checked his watch.  The Clockwork Guild had presented it to his father in the hopes that the Duke would support their attempts to block out upstarts from challenging their monopoly and his father and passed it onto him.  It was barely five hours before the wedding was scheduled to begin.  He would have gone then, or never, but his father had other ideas.  The wedding would provide a priceless opportunity for networking and he had no intention of missing any of it.

He patted the woman on the shoulder and she rolled over, tiredly.  Lucas was tempted to wake her up all the way and have another round, but he was never sure where he stood with the serving girls.  Were they willing to share their bodies with him because he was their master’s son, because they hoped that he would reward them, because they dreamed that he would make one of them his wife...or because they’d been charmed into obedience?  His father had never had doubts or cares; he’d just taken any woman who took his fancy and to hell with what she felt about it.  Lucas...liked to think that he was kinder, even if he didn't quite dare stand up to his father.

The servants had heated up the bath already and he washed himself quickly, before donning his formal robes and strapping his sword to his belt.  His father had warned him to carry a sword at all times and Lucas hadn't objected, even though his rank and position had always protected him from all harm.  Besides, his father had made a bargain with the Dark Sorcerers and, for all his confidence, Lucas was much less sure that it was a wise idea.  The Tribunal was still out there somewhere...and Merlin had always been merciless to anyone caught working with the Dark Sorcerers.  But Merlin was gone...

His father was waiting downstairs impatiently, wearing his own formal robes.  Beside him, Lucas’s little sister waited, wearing a green dress that neatly offset her blue eyes and blonde hair.  Lucas felt an odd flicker of protectiveness as he saw his sister, for Emma had her mother’s hair and appearance.  His father would, he knew, one day use Emma for his political games, but until then...Lucas spoiled her, as much as he dared.  She was the one sweet thing in his life.

“So you’re finally up,” he said, darkly.  “I have always told you not to dally overlong with the serving wenches.”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said, flushing.  He’d have bet good money that his father didn't enjoy his dalliances with commoner women, even if he did have a different woman in bed each night.  It was all about propagating the bloodline and creating magicians outside the strict control of the Colleges of Magic.  “She was just remarkably good in bed.”

He’d hoped to irritate his father, just a little, but the Duke showed no reaction.  “The coach is waiting for us outside,” he said, tightly.  The wedding wasn't just the social event of the year; it was likely to be the last social event of the year.  Lucas didn't have his father’s skill at reading the ebb and flow of politics in Camelot to know that people were already choosing sides and firming up alliances.  “We’re late, boy.”

There was still four and a half hours before the wedding officially began, but Lucas knew better than to point that out.  Instead, he followed his father and Emma out of the mansion and down towards the coach, already decked out in the ducal colours.  They could have walked from the small mansion to the Summer Palace and arrived with plenty of time to spare, but that wasn't his father’s way.  Making an impressive appearance – with the suggestion of limitless funds and manpower – was all part of the game.  Emma shouted out in delight as the coachman opened the door and helped her to climb into the horse-drawn carriage.  Lucas merely felt bored.  If it had been up to him, he’d have preferred to walk or ride.  Carriages had always made him feel sick.

His father waved a finger in the air, testing the privacy spells someone had carefully spelled into the coach, and then looked over at Lucas, his cold eyes boring into his son’s skull.  The coach shook and shivered into life, heading down towards the road that led up to the Summer Palace.  Not by coincidence, their route would take them though Waterford and allow the population to see the Duke’s power.

“I expect you to mingle, as you have always done,” his father said.  “Keep a firm hold on Emma” – both son and daughter looked rebellious at that order, but their father ignored their expressions – “and ensure that you’re both seen.”

Lucas scowled, inwardly.  He hadn't wanted to go to the wedding in the first place.  The only thing that had made it acceptable was the chance of meeting up with some of his friends and enjoying some...darker pleasures somewhere within the Summer Palace’s endless corridors.  With Emma at his side, that wouldn't be a possibility.

“I understand, father,” he said, reluctantly.

“See that you do,” his father said.  “I shall be speaking to the other Dukes and then to some of the Lords.  Between us, we should be ready to act when the Privy Council finally loses its grip and power naturally passes to us, the House of Lords.  We shall control a heavy block of votes that will put us in control of the Empire.”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said.

His father eyed him for a long moment, and then smiled.  “And I think I am going to have to teach you how to get your hands dirty,” he added, with a smile that might just have been mistaken for paternal.  “The only people you can rely on in this world are those who share your blood.”

The coach shook again as it turned onto the long road that led towards the Summer Palace.  Lucas reached for the heavy curtain and drew it back, staring up towards the building – and the line of coaches making their way up the road.  His father wouldn't be too pleased to see that they’d been beaten to their goal, although their ducal precedence would allow them to push their way to the front of the queue.  The Court would see and people would talk.  He sighed and lent back as Emma scrambled to the window herself.  She’d never visited the Summer Palace.

Merlin had designed it himself, or so the legend went.  It was a strange spindly building, with towers reaching up towards the sky, creating an effect that suggested something out of Avalon.  Unlike the Iron Palace, it hadn't been created and held in place with magic, although the wards Merlin had established to guard his retreat had fallen when he’d left the world behind.  A handful of Knights, backed up by combat magicians, were checking everyone as they passed through the stone gate and into the courtyard.  Lucas felt their questing magic passing over him, only to be deflected by the wards his father’s magicians had constructed around him.  His father lent out of the coach, barked a few orders to the Knights, and they were waved forward to the front of the queue.

“Come on, boy,” his father grunted, as the coach finally lumbered to a stop.  Lucas scrambled out of the vehicle and looked upwards, momentarily stunned by the sheer immensity of the Summer Palace.  The building had  a sense of presence that seemed to belay its fragile appearance.  “We need to present ourselves before the fun really starts.”

Lucas rolled his eyes, but followed him up the steps and into the first chamber.  A pair of uniformed servants took their coats while a third escorted them down a long crystalline corridor and halted them at the top of a second flight of steps.  The herald took their cards, checked their faces, and raised his voice.  It echoed through the entire chamber.

“His Excellency, Duke Rufus Valditch, Duke of Effrul; The Honourable Lord Lucas, Heir to Effrul; The Honourable Lady Emma...”

It struck Lucas as pointless – the ballroom had only a handful of people watching their descent – but his father walked as regally as if he were stepping into a crowded room, with every eye following his process.  A handful of lesser lords started to bow and scrape in front of his father, who pointed Lucas towards a pair of noble-born girls who had been admiring the delicate wooden statues someone had placed on a long table.  Sighing, Lucas took Emma’s hand and headed over to join them.  Maybe they’d say something interesting, after all.

***
Robin was shaking inwardly, despite his armour and Excalibur, as he walked up the aisle behind the Archbishop of Canterbury.  He would have preferred another priest, perhaps the Knight’s Father Confessor, to perform the ceremony, but there was no way that they could refuse the Archbishop when he’d ‘offered’ to perform the wedding.  Politics, again.  It had occurred to him that politics would always be a part of his life if he married Tiffany, yet there was no avoiding it.  The mere possession of Excalibur – as long as the blade chose to stay with him – would make him a focal point for politics.

The room had filled up with the great and the good, the Empire’s hereditary aristocracy and the hundreds of Commoners who had fought their way into powerful positions.  Some of them weren’t entirely human, but Merlin had empowered them and – so far – no one had worked up the nerve to act against them.  A splashing sound at one end of the room announced the presence of a merman and his four wives, floating in a pool someone had specially constructed for their presence; behind them, a pack of werewolves sat, their faces oddly canine, marking them out for life.  Robin felt an odd flicker of guilt as he saw their canine eyes; he'd killed a werewolf once, two years ago.  He’d been bitten and driven mad by the experience, but the werewolf had still come alarmingly close to ending his life.  Robin had eventually run it through with a silver dagger and burned the body.  It was the only way to be sure.

Merlin had been ambient, at best, about near-human creatures – and most humans were inclined to fear and hate those who had been unlucky enough to be born into the supernatural.  Werewolves were banned outside their own lands – the old prejudice was too strong – and mermen tended to live away from shipping lanes.  It wasn't too surprising, really.  What merman and mermaids called singing everyone else regarded as a dreadful racket.  And some mermaids became sirens and lured sailors to their deaths on hidden rocks.

The room started to quieten as Robin took his place – the glowing Excalibur on his belt – and waited for quiet.  The Archbishop glared around him, intimidating most of the noblemen into silence.  At a nod from him, the choir stood up and started to sing a long and complicated hymn, silencing the remainder of the room.  Robin saw angry glances being passed from commoner to commoner and scowled inwardly.  The hymn concentrated on the need for servitude and contentment with one’s lot, not something to appeal to those born to the lower classes.  But then, the church had always been in bed with the noblemen.  It was a thought that almost made him smile.

Silence fell, broken only by the sound of a handful of people coughing and shuffling their feet.  Robin had a moment to feel nervous – she might have decided not to marry him, after all – before the door opened and Tiffany stepped forward, followed by her five bridesmaids.  Her face was hidden behind a white veil, but it couldn't hide her long red hair, nor the shape of her body as she kept moving forwards.  Robin felt a sudden sense of contentment that had nothing to do with Excalibur.  Everything just felt right.

Tiffany stopped in front of him and dropped a curtsey to the Archbishop, who nodded to the choir.  The small boys broke out into song again, this time a more popular hymn about God’s creation of the world and how humanity was charged with protecting it from abuse.  Robin knew – he didn't know if the Archbishop knew – that the song had its origins in humanity’s brutal wars with the Elves, and many of the creatures from the Greenwood.  It was a fairly martial hymn.

The Archbishop stepped forward as the hymn came to an end and silence fell.  “Dearly beloved,” he said, his voice echoing around the huge chamber.  The Church’s official stance on magic notwithstanding, Robin suspected that he was using a spell to enhance his voice.  “We are gathered here today to celebrate the marriage of two God-fearing Christians, Lady Tiffany of Shalott and Sir Robin, Knight of the Round Table.”

Robin smiled, inwardly, at the reaction.  It was rare for noblewomen to marry outside the nobility, even though Knights of the Round Table often counted as nobles.  Putting Tiffany’s name first was a mocking reminder that she was his social superior.  The Church hadn't said anything, overtly, about its view on the marriage, but that had been when Merlin had been present.  If they had a different opinion...

“Marriage is a holy state, conceived by God,” the Archbishop said.  His voice kept echoing outwards, loudly enough that it could be heard outside the Summer Palace.  “When the Lord created man and woman, he ordained rules for them, that they might live peacefully together and rise towards Heaven.  He created man to serve as the protector and maintainer of woman; he created woman to serve as the mother of children and companion of man.  Marriage is the ultimate expression of those rules, when a young couple chooses to live together, forsaking all others, sharing their lives until death does them part.  The man must keep and protect the woman; the woman must bear his children and serve and obey her man.”

There was a long pause.  “It is a solemn commitment, sworn before God.  For those who enter into marriage rashly, without due reflection and prayer, it can become a burden.  For those who shrink from entering marriage, fearing to lose themselves in their partner, their lives are often spent alone, without children to being them comfort and care for them when they grow old.  Marriage is not an act to be entered into through passion, or guilt, but solely through the desire to form a partnership and rise towards God.”

He stopped, his gaze sweeping over the audience.  “If there is anyone here who knows just cause or impediment why these two should not marry,” he said, “speak now or forever hold your peace.”

Robin froze.  He was familiar enough with Tiffany’s body language to know that she was nervous too.  Merlin had blessed their match, but Merlin was gone.  If someone in the audience – Lord Lucas, perhaps – wanted to object...it would certainly throw a spanner into the works.  The Archbishop would have an opportunity to forbid the match, if he wanted to forbid the match.  The seconds seemed to tick on endlessly...

“I ask again,” the Archbishop said.  “If there is anyone here who knows just cause or impediment why these two should not marry, I command you to speak now or forever hold your peace.”

There was a long, pregnant pause.  The Archbishop repeated the question a third time, and waited.  No one spoke.

“No one has raised just cause or impediment why these two should not marry,” he said.  If he was angry or even irritated, he said nothing.  “Sir Robin of Loxley, Knight of the Round Table.  Do you accept the woman Tiffany, Lady of Shalott, as your lawfully wedded wife, in sickness and in health, forsaking all others and hewing solely to her until death do you part?”

Robin could feel Excalibur’s soft amusement as he spoke.  “I do.”

The Archbishop smiled.  “Lady Tiffany, Lady of Shalott.  Do you accept the man Robin of Loxley, Knight of the Round Table, as your lawfully wedded husband?  Do you accept him as your protector and maintainer, swearing to love, honour and obey him until death do you part?”

“I do,” Tiffany said.  

Robin flushed, inwardly.  He'd never realised how...condescending the marriage vows were to women, at least until he’d faced marriage himself.  Perhaps the nobility had had a point when they’d raised objections, even in secrecy; Tiffany could place Shalott and everything that a noble title brought into his hands.  He swore to himself that he would not abuse her love and faith in him.

“You have sworn to accept one another,” the Archbishop said.  He reached into his robes and produced a simple golden case.  It opened at the touch of a finger, revealing a pair of golden rings.  Merlin had produced them personally and presented them to Tiffany when they’d become engaged.  It surprised Robin that they still glowed when so much else Merlin had created had died when he’d vanished.  “Sir Robin, take one of the rings and put it on her finger.”

Robin’s fingers felt unstable as he picked up one of the rings and studied it, noting the writing Merlin had engraved along the edge.  It fitted Tiffany’s finger perfectly, unsurprisingly.  Merlin had done his work well.  A moment later, she placed her own ring on his finger...

...Something was wrong.  He could feel it.  Excalibur was screaming a warning into his very soul.  Unaware of what he was doing, or why, he lunged forward and knocked Tiffany to the ground.  The Archbishop opened his mouth to protest, too late.  Something was happening at the rear of the chamber.  Something bad...

An instant later, a flash of green light struck the Archbishop and blasted him into the choir.

Chapter Fifteen

The Sorcerer Vale had never expected the plan to work.

Like all great plans, it was simple in concept and execution.  The Dark Sorcerers – freshly charged with magical energies drained from sacrificed humans – had transfigured themselves into small objects, which their master had then arranged to be shipped into the Summer Palace.  The Dark Sorcerers might have privately had their doubts about the plan, but none of them had dared to object when their master ordered them to prepare to depart.  Now, when the spell ran out of time, they found themselves amidst a crowd of rich and powerful aristocrats.  The slaughter began instantly.

“Take them,” Vale roared, casting a lethal spell towards the young couple on the dais.  The man had the reactions of a cat, for he knocked his wife down before she could be caught by the spell and killed.  Vale barely noticed, for he was too busy casting other spells, right into the crowd.  Their master had given them a list of people he wanted targeted and killed – senior aristocrats, powerful politicians – and they all knew better than to return unsuccessful.  “Kill them all!”

A Knight of the Round Table was halfway through drawing his sword when a green flash of light caught him in the chest and killed him instantly.  Vale smiled to himself, even though the death had been mercifully quick rather than unpleasantly prolonged, allowing necromancers such as himself to draw power from the dying man.  A Knight was a dangerous opponent and the sooner they were all killed the better.  He had better luck with a magician who’d produced his wand and tried to cast a spell of his own, only to see it glance off the sorcerer’s wards.  Vale struck him with an agonising curse that even another sorcerer would have struggled to lift, just before firing another series of curses into the packed crowd.  Caught by surprise, unused to anything like physical danger, most of the aristocrats were starting to panic.  The few who were armed and willing to fight would have problems even reaching their foes.

Behind him, an explosion shook the entire Summer Palace.  The spell-controlled maid hadn’t been the only one to have been turned into an unwitting saboteur.  When the fun began, the others had been ordered to wreak a little havoc, raise a little hell.  The forces outside on the lawn wouldn't have the slightest idea of what was actually going on, at least until it was far too late.  Vale blew a wave of fire into a teenage noblewoman who’d been knocked to her knees by the pressure of the crowd, watching as her body slowly burned away to ash.  He laughed aloud, a terrifying sound.  His master would be pleased.

He ducked, instinctively, as a wave of bright spells cascaded over his head.  A pair of combat magicians had forced their way through the crowd and were throwing spells at the Dark Sorcerers, trying to keep them busy long enough for reinforcements to arrive.  Vale lifted his own wand and cast a shimmering curse, trying to hold them in place long enough to start draining their power, but even though they had smaller reserves of power than his own, they were clearly skilled in using it.  They escaped the trap, jumped back and kept moving.  One of them was killed by a spell from one of the other Dark Sorcerers; the other fired back a spell Vale didn’t recognise, somehow burning through his companion’s wards.  The Dark Sorcerer died in agony, just before Vale dispatched the second combat magician with a single quick spell.

A low rumbling sound caught his ears and he turned, just in time to see a brass statue of a horse come to life and gallop towards them.  Vale almost smiled; enchanted statues would serve as a defence against normal men, but they were useless against Dark Sorcery.  He blew the first statue into rubble before it could get anywhere near him, ordering his followers to concentrate on the others.  Flames were starting to spread through the building, drawing on dark magic to ensure that they couldn’t be extinguished in a hurry.  The entire Summer Palace would burn to the ground before the defenders could organise their remaining wizards into fighting the fire.

Laughing, Vale pressed his attack.  There wouldn't be much time before the defenders rallied and launched a counter-attack, but until then, the day was theirs.  A father, trying to shield his two young children, was struck by a mind-controlling spell.  Helplessly, he could only watch as his fingers closed round the necks of his children and squeezed hard, crushing the life out of them.  There was much necromantic power to be drawn from sacrifice, Vale had been taught when he’d dared to reach for sorcery, and unwilling sacrifices offered the greatest power of all.  He laughed again and killed the man with a final spell…

***
Robin felt the entire building shake as most of the crowd tried to flee.  By long tradition, very few defenders had been permitted within the ballroom, where the wedding had been taking place.  The small army outside would need time to get organised and fight its way into the building…how the hell had the Dark Sorcerers even gotten inside?  Sorcerers could teleport without needing anchors or the pathways that led through Avalon, but that was such an obvious way to attack that the building had been warded against teleport spells.  It wasn't hard to disrupt an incoming teleport and scatter the sorcerer over several thousand miles…

He rolled off Tiffany and triggered the spells built into his armour.  White-gold armour plate, created by Merlin himself and bonded to Robin’s very soul, spread out over his body.  The first time he’d tried to walk in the armour, he’d kept falling down; now, it felt almost like a second skin.  Carefully, he pulled himself to his feet and drew Excalibur.  The sword’s eerie – and yet welcoming – glow spread out, calming the room.  He felt the sword’s energies shimmering into him, refreshing his body.  It was time to fight.

Nine Dark Sorcerers stood on one of the marble tables, wands in hand.  They weren’t trying to hide the damage wrought on their bodies by Dark Sorcerer, presenting a terrifying impression to the rest of the world.  These were men, Robin knew, who wouldn't hesitate to bargain with demons or consort with goblins for power, their depredations held in check only by Merlin’s power and his servants, the Tribunal.  They would be desperate and yet confident, knowing that Merlin was gone.  He didn’t want to think about how many had died in the handful of minutes since they’d revealed themselves.

He held Excalibur up in front of him and had the pleasure of seeing the Dark Sorcerers hesitate, as if they feared the magical blade.  They did fear a weapon that could cut through wards as if they weren't even there, killing its target and sending them to face judgement.  No one became a Dark Sorcerer without making a few questionable bargains along the way and if they died, those bargains would come due.  For a fraction of a second, he dared to hope that they would surrender or teleport out, before they broke free of their paralysis.  Their leader pointed a long wand at Robin and uttered a word that sounded utterly inhuman, as if he’d pronounced the sound of broken glass.  There was a blinding flash of light and a flicker of…something flashed out at Robin…

Excalibur moved, as if it was acting of its own accord.  The spell clashed against the glowing blade and vanished, absorbed into the material that formed the sword.  Robin felt a brief tingle passing through his hands and then nothing.  The Dark Sorcerer stared at him, and then raised his wand again, chanting a spell in a language so old that no one apart from magicians and scholars even knew that it existed.  Robin felt the hair standing up on his neck even before the spell was completed and a colossal wall of flame appeared between the two of them.  The heat was so great that he found himself taking a step backwards, but it offered no relief.  The hellfire was burning away at his very soul…

His hands tightened on the blade and a wave of coolness flowed into his body, leaving him standing upright, if weakly.  He took a step forward, and then another, until he was walking right into the flames.  They couldn’t touch him any longer, as long as he held the glowing blade.  The fires suddenly receded behind him as he stepped out of them, meeting the Dark Sorcerer’s eyes as he stared in shock.  His eyes were burning embers set within a frail skull, a warning of the horrors to come.  Eventually, Dark Sorcerers lost control of their own powers and were consumed by them, burning to embers and leaving nothing, but ash.

The Dark Sorcerer stepped backwards and leapt, suddenly, drawing on magic to enhance his flight.  He was across the room in a second, standing by the ruined doors that had once opened to allow Tiffany and her bridesmaids to enter the chamber.  A second Dark Sorcerer appeared out of nowhere and lunged forward, carrying a stone wand in his left hand.  Robin didn’t need Excalibur to feel the power emanating from the wand, revealing its true nature – an Object of Power.  There were a hundred legends about stone wands and none of them ended well.  The wand clashed against Excalibur and shattered on the glowing blade.  Robin felt a shock passing through his hands, but he ignored it, swinging the mighty blade through the sorcerer’s chest.  It felt as if he’d driven a hit knife through butter.  The sorcerer’s body, cut in two, flared into dark flames before collapsing on the floor.

“Excalibur,” Robin breathed.  His armour tingled as a new attack began, a handful of Dark Sorcerers throwing spells and curses right into his face, trying to keep him off guard.  Excalibur moved as if it had a mind of its own, blocking and deflecting curses with ease, even knocking two of them back towards their senders.  He raised his voice as he swung the sword upwards, remembering the battle cry that had terrified thousands of sorcerers over the years.  “For Camelot and Arthur!”

He lunged forward and they fell before him like wheat under a scythe.

***
Vale hadn’t believed most of the stories about Excalibur, not really.  In the world of the Dark Sorcerers, King Arthur had never been anything other than Merlin’s puppet.  Excalibur, an Object of Power, had been created by Merlin to ensure that his favoured candidate became King of England, while the real power remained firmly in Merlin’s hands.  It was what they would have done in his place, they knew; those with magic had the right to rule those without magic.  The idea of a sword making anyone, even a Knight of the Round Table, a match for a sorcerer was a terrifying thought.  It could not be tolerated.

And yet, the bridegroom they’d come to kill was tearing through his followers.  Vale didn’t waste time mourning them, not when he knew that they would have tried to kill him as soon as they felt powerful enough to challenge him, but watching them die was…disconcerting.  Excalibur sliced through their wards as if they weren't even there, somehow protecting it’s wieldier from attacks both physical and magical.  Vale watched a curse that should have burned through any level of protection glance off the sword and shatter harmlessly against the wall.  He didn’t dare run – his master would kill him – and he didn’t dare face Excalibur and its bearer alone.  And there were no others to help him.  The Dark Sorcerers who hadn’t been committed to the surprise attack had been held in reserve, joining their master in his attack on the outskirts of the Palace.

Cursing, he knew that he had no choice.  Drawing on spells he’d memorised years ago, he started to chant.  It was incredibly risky to perform any kind of summoning without proper wards and careful preparation, but somehow he doubted that the Knight of the Round Table would allow him to draw a pentagram on the floor and spend two hours casting wards around the chamber.  Shaping the wards in his mind, casting a final illusion spell to win a last few seconds, he performed the ritual of summoning.  The air seemed to bend and twist in front of him as something began to emerge from the Darkness, a presence that was far darker than anything born to mortal man.  A wash of flames shot up from the floor, driving Vale back, and formed into the shape of a man, wrapped in burning flames.  The demon laughed, its presence soiling the air on so many levels, and lunged towards the Knight.  And Vale, exhausted after burning through the last reserves of his sorcery, turned and fled.  The demon should keep the Knight busy for a while…

***
Robin flinched backwards as the demon lashed out with one fiery hand and washed fire over his armour.  The heat was overwhelming and pain seared down his left side, even though the armour and Excalibur’s protection.  He tried to focus against the pain, but the living wall of fire lunged towards him again and washed fire right into his eyes. Excalibur’s protection spared him from instant death, or blindness, yet it was still hard to see.  New fires were springing up everywhere the demon walked.  The flames were running from body to body, causing a horrific smell to appear in the air, like a thousand roasted dead bodies.  Robin gagged as the demon laughed, before shooting a wave of fire towards the dais where he’d married Tiffany.  He shouted an angry curse at the demon, which turned and stamped towards him.  He’d feared that Tiffany wouldn't come to the wedding, or that one or more of the noblemen would take the opportunity to forbid the match, not Dark Sorcerers and demons!

He scowled, drawing on the sword’s vast reserves to jump backwards, winning time.  In hindsight, the marriage would have been an obvious target for the Dark Sorcerers.  All the great and good of the Empire, the elected representatives and hereditary noblemen, gathered together in one place.  How could any Dark Sorcerer resist such a target?  And yet, the High Magus and many of the House of Magus were here too.  The Dark Sorcerers might have bitten off more than they could chew.  Or maybe they believed that, without Merlin, the advantage was firmly in their hands.  They might have the power to win.

Robin breathed a prayer for Tiffany as the demon’s fiery hands reached down towards the dead bodies.  Flames licked through them and they slowly rose to their feet, shambling forward in a mocking parody of human life.  Rage flared through his mind, only to be dampened by Excalibur.  The sword was forcing him to remain calm and composed.  If the demon wanted to play with him, rather than simply killing him at once, it would give them an opportunity to banish the demon back to hell.  He waited until the first shambling figure was right on top of him, then he jumped, drawing on the sword again to leap right over the figures and down between them and their demonic master.  It was hard to read the demon’s expressions on its ever-changing face, but it looked surprised.

He didn’t hesitate.  Excalibur sang as he stabbed forward, pushing the sword right into the demon’s fire. The demon howled in pain, yet seemed to remain alive; the fires that the sorcerer had used to anchor the demon in the fixed lands simply wafted around Excalibur.  Robin pushed the sword forward, heedless of the flaming zombies that had turned and were now shambling towards his back.  The power that formed Excalibur clashed directly with the power that had summoned the demon out of Hell and bound it to the mortal realm.  There was a final flash of fire, so hot that Robin felt sure that he was about to catch fire himself, and then the demon was gone.  The shambling zombies dropped to the floor as the controlling will vanished.  Robin cut off their heads anyway, just to be sure.  Demons were tricky creatures, powered by malice and eternal evil.  And turning invisible was one of their tricks.

Breathing hard, he looked around.  The ballroom was deserted.  Most of the guests had either fled or had been killed, either by the Dark Sorcerers or by the panic.  Excalibur was pulling at him, guiding Robin forward.  He took one last look for Tiffany – he hoped that she’d had the sense to get out of the way - and then followed the sword’s call.

Outside, he found himself staring down a blackened and twisted corridor.  The demonic flames were slowly consuming the whole building.  He could hear screams and cries for help in the distance, so he started towards them when he heard a gasp and turned, sword in hand. The Dark Sorcerer was kneeling there, trying desperately to recover from expending so much magic.  Robin met his fiery eyes and knew what fate awaited him.  The ruler of Hell, Merlin’s father, would not be pleased with the loss of a fire demon.  And the Dark Sorcerer had, long ago, damned his soul to hell.  Unless he repented in the next few seconds, he would be in the hands of Satan…

The Dark Sorcerer let out a cry and lunged forward, silver knife in hand, launching one last desperate attempt to win.  And Robin slashed down with Excalibur and beheaded him, sending his body crashing to the floor.  For a moment, he stared down at the dark flames consuming his enemy’s body and then turned to run towards the screams.  He had a horrific feeling that the worst was yet to come.

Chapter Sixteen

The power burned through Maledict as he led the charge against the Summer Palace.  There was no doubting that this first attack had achieved the advantage of surprise – and the spells they’d unleashed inside the wards had crippled them, rendering the Summer Palace defenceless.  The soldiers who’d been patrolling the gardens seemed caught between two fires, unsure of which threat to tackle first.  Maledict chanted words in a long-forgotten tongue and struck down most of the soldiers before they could react.  The remainder scattered and started to flee.  There was no escape from the oncoming Dark Sorcerers.

Maledict laughed aloud as he drew on his power and flew over the wall, coming down amidst the dead and dying bodies.  This was true power.  He’d never dared call upon his sorcery so blatantly before, even in the Greenwood, but now the power was his and there was nothing to stop him taking what he wanted.  Merlin was gone and Maledict, his true heir, would take his rightful place as ruler of the Empire.  And then the whole world would be at his mercy.

He pointed his wand at the palace and chanted a spell aloud, enjoying the sensation of power.  A flicker of light shot from his wand and smashed through the palace’s upper windows, adding to the chaos and the fires already burning through the building.  The remaining guards were trying to fight or run, but it hardly mattered.  Maledict cast a command spell over a handful of guards and sent them turning against their fellows.  The combat magicians were disorganised and likely to remain so for the next few minutes.  They’d be unable to put up any defence against the advancing Dark Sorcerers.

A pair of Knights of the Round Table, armour glowing in the sunlight, leapt out of the building and onto the ground in front of them.  Their armour provided some protection against dark magic, but the sheer power the dark Sorcerers could throw at them overwhelmed their protections and rendered them helpless.  Spending power freely, knowing that there might not be a second chance to slaughter so many of their enemies in one go, the Dark Sorcerers took the opportunity to torment the Knights before killing them, drawing on their life energies to add to their power.

Maledict barked commands into the air as they captured the gardens.  A team of Dark Sorcerers would head down the road towards Waterford and the soldiers garrisoned there, using their powers to sow fear and panic among their enemies.  The remainder would go into the building itself, hunting down the remainder of their foes before they could escape.  Maledict chuckled to himself as he blasted a hole in the wall and forced his way into the Summer Palace.  The enemy had never dreamed that they would be attacked at a wedding, or they would have assembled an entire army to protect their First Councillor.  Not that it would have made much difference, of course.

The magical field flared around him as he stepped into the building.  They’d blown their way into the dining hall, which had been set for a feast to honour the bride and groom.  Maledict remembered what it had been like to be hungry and poor, back before he’d discovered his magical talent, and felt anger burning through him, feeding his power.  A wave of his wand sent the tables crashing down, showering their expensive contents onto the floor.  He spoke a curse, poisoning the remaining food and drink, before leading his sorcerers onwards, into the antechamber.  The magical field ahead was strengthening, suggesting that another sorcerer was waiting for them.  There could be little doubt who was ahead…

He stepped into a large chamber, meant for smaller gatherings, and smiled.  The High Magus stood alone at the far end of the chamber.  He should have had a small army of lesser sorcerers and wizards from the magical colleges, but he was alone.  In one hand, he held a wand hewn from wood and sharpened by magic; in the other, he carried a single golden key.  His long beard hung down towards the floor, twisting and curling as if it had a mind of its own.  With sorcery involved, that was very possible.

Merlin had tried to prevent wizards from turning to sorcery to expand their powers, but at that, at least, he'd been unsuccessful.  A magician would sell his own grandmother to expand his powers, if he wasn’t contented with his lot.  The few sorcerers who survived the attempt without losing their lives or their sanity were often powerful and dangerous, but they were rarely as powerful as the truly insane.  A sorcerer who remained sane was inhibited from drawing too strongly on his powers, a weakness Maledict had never understood.  In the end, there was only power – and he was the most powerful magician left in the fixed lands.

The High Magus half-bowed, never taking his eyes off Maledict.  “This is going to end,” he said, very calmly.  He sounded tired and worn, even though he hadn’t been fighting.  “You have no idea of the dangers of what you are trying to do.”

Maledict felt a hot flash of anger.  How dare the senile idiot talk down to him?  It occurred to him that the High Magus was trying to make him angry, in the hopes that he would make a mistake, but it hardly mattered.  Sorcery was driven by emotion as much as anything else and an angry sorcerer could be incredibly dangerous.  And besides, what did he have to fear from a man who had refused to give up his sanity and claim true power?

He hefted his wand, shaping a curse in his mind.  “Give up your power and I will let you live,” he growled. It wasn't a sincere offer.  His power was already building up around him, waiting for release.  “You could…”

“No,” the High Magus said, simply.  “Give this up now before something goes really badly wrong.”

Maledict didn’t bother with a response.  He threw the nastiest curse he could at the High Magus, a complex spell that needed perfect timing and skill to defect.  The High Magus, trained in magical arts and wizardry, caught it with seemingly effortless skill and tossed back a trick of his own.  Maledict parried it neatly and shot a simpler curse, trying to overpower the High Magus’s defences.  The High Magus countered with a network of glowing spells that threatened to push Maledict and his allies back into the gardens.  Dispelling it required more brute force than Maledict would have preferred to use.

The other Dark Sorcerers fell back, watching the duel.  They wouldn't help either side, not when two mighty sorcerers were settling their differences.  If Maledict won, they’d be intimidated enough to refrain from challenging him for a while; if he lost, they’d turn on the High Magus while he was weakened from the duel.  Maledict scowled as he threw several spells at once, only to see them rebound off a glowing golden shield that the High Magus had summoned out of nowhere.  Rage built through him as the High Magus started to taunt him, mocking him.

“You’re nothing,” the High Magus said.  “You have power, without the wit to control it.  You never learned the basics of wizardry before you gained power and…”

“Shut up,” Maledict snapped.  His power shimmered out of him, without focus.  He pressed it forwards against the High Magus, bringing their magic fields into contact and pushing, hard.  The golden shield vanished as the High Magus staggered backwards, trying to fire off a set of spells that might break the contact long enough to save his life.  Maledict kept pushing, allowing all the power he’d gained from the sacrifices to flow into the High Magus.  It was easy to twist the power and burn through the High Magus’s wards…

The High Magus opened his mouth, although there was no way to know if he wanted to shout a curse or beg for mercy. Maledict’s power broke through his wards and slashed into his body.  All the knowledge and power the High Magus had gained over the years lay exposed in front of him.  Maledict drained it into his own wards, and then blasted the High Magus backwards, slamming him into the antechamber.  He chuckled darkly, feeling slightly dizzy from the battle, and waved his Dark Sorcerers onwards.  By the time they left, they would leave nothing behind in the ruins, but corpses.

***
Lucas hadn’t had the slightest idea that something was about to happen until the Dark Sorcerers appeared and started firing down at the crowd.  His father had reacted coolly, as always, and grabbed his son by the scruff of the neck, pushing him into a secret passageway right behind them.  Lucas had taken Emma’s hand and pulled her into the passageway, praying that they’d be overlooked in the chaos.  It didn’t seem too likely.  The entire building was shivering as magical spells shook its very foundations.  The Summer Palace might be on the verge of collapsing, just like the Iron Palace.  A tingle ran through the air as one of the combatants unleashed a spell that seemed to have no designated target.  In the overheated passageway, it was enough to send sweat trickling down his back.

He knew nothing about the tunnel network – he hadn’t even known that it had existed, at least until his father had shoved them in and shut the door behind them – and found himself forced to crawl towards the light.  The light proved to be coming from a tiny peephole, not unlike the ones he’d used when he’d started to become interested in girls.  He peered through the peephole and saw the final moments of the High Magus’s battle with the Dark Sorcerer, his body smashed and left to bleed out on the floor.  The Dark Sorcerer no longer looked even remotely human.  Behind him, a line of his followers spread out, intent on slaughtering everyone in the building.  One of them was Shade.

My God, Lucas thought.  He didn’t dare speak aloud.  He’d known that his father was ruthless, but this…it was insane!  Lucas or Emma could have been killed in the crossfire, or…had his father chosen their position so he could get his children out of the firing line, once all hell broke loose?  And if his father had known what was coming…what could Lucas do about it?  What could anyone do about it?

He clutched his sister’s hand and prayed, silently in the darkness, for a rescue that might never come.

***
Tiffany muttered a spell under her breath and most of the wedding dress disintegrated into dust, leaving behind only her undergarments.  It would have been scandalous under normal circumstances, even though she was still decently covered, but now she needed to move.  The entire building was coming down around her ears.  She could feel shockwaves threatening the building’s very foundation as she ran, wishing she could stay and fight.  If she died, she knew, the Empire would fragment.  She knew that she didn’t dare be captured…

A spell struck her in the back and sent her falling forward, eldritch energy skittering over her body.  It took everything she had to break the spell before it broke through her wards and into her mind.  Her would-be captor rolled her over and gazed down at her through burning eyes.  Tiffany snapped out a spell and had the pleasure of seeing her attacker thrown backwards, just before a massive shockwave ran through the palace and the whole section disintegrated.  She covered her head desperately as walls and ceilings started to collapse, flashing back to the fall of the Iron Palace.  Her attacker stumbled forward, murder written on his twisted face, only to be struck by a piece of falling masonry.  Before she could react, strong hands grabbed her from behind and shoved her down to the ground.  Dark magic flared around her, keeping her from fighting or running.  

She looked up, into the faces of a pair of Dark Sorcerers.  They clearly knew who she was and had more in mind than murder, or rape.  As a hostage, Tiffany would have great value – although perhaps less than they thought.  One of them hauled her to her feet and ran his hand down her arm, unlocking half of her protection wards.  Once she was effectively naked, they could reprogram her at will.  She called desperately to Merlin, to the power she’d always been able to call upon in the past, but there was no answer.  She was alone, with nothing to call upon.  Even Robin and his sword were somewhere else…

There was a colossal roar.  A shimmering gout of fire blasted down, reducing one of the Dark Sorcerers to a pile of air.  Tiffany heard the beating of mighty wings as a dragon floated high overhead, blocking out the sunlight with its colossal scaly body.  Brilliant golden eyes fixed upon the second Dark Sorcerer, just before the dragon’s claw reached down, pinched through the wards and crushed the sorcerer like a bug.  A dragon was the most magical creature to live in the fixed lands; their power was awesome, if concentrated on flying and defence.  It took special wards to stand up to a dragon.

Tiffany felt the spell break and nearly collapsed onto the ground.  “Get up,” Eleanor shouted at her.  The Dragon Mistress looked nervous, even though it took a very powerful curse to harm or even threaten a dragon.  There were still too many Dark Sorcerers wandering the grounds, trying to kill all of the guests.  “Get onto the dragon’s back, quickly!”

“Coming,” Tiffany said.  Her body hurt, but she managed to banish the pain with a small spell.  The reserves of power she should have been able to call upon were gone, a lingering result of the capture spell.  “What’s happening?”

“It looks like war,” Eleanor said.  She sounded excited.  The Dragon Riders hadn’t; gone to war ever since the Serpent Wars.  “The entire building is burning down and there are flames and smoke coming from Waterford.  There are Dark Sorcerers everywhere.”

Tiffany shuddered as she climbed onto the dragon, scrambling up the scaly green plates that made up its skin.  Robin had warned that the Dark Sorcerers were planning something, but who would have considered this?  Who would have imagined…but then, they’d been far too used to Merlin’s power limiting magical depredations. And with his departure, they’d entered a whole new world…

Behind them, as the dragon climbed into the sky, the Summer Palace burned.

***
Maledict watched angrily as the dragon vanished into the clouds, carrying with it the planned kidnapping target.  Lady Tiffany would have made a useful slave once her mind had been broken and reprogrammed, but it wasn't going to happen now.  He was tempted to keep fighting and slaughtering, yet there was little point.  The Garrison would have dispatched reinforcements as soon as they heard of the attack – and they might have sent other dragons to join the fight.

He turned to gaze upon his remaining Dark Sorcerers.  He’d led nearly fifty into battle, but seven of them had been killed outright and two more were on the verge of death and useless.  He killed them both with a wave of his hand and then turned to look at the fires burning through the Summer Palace.  Whatever happened now, the Empire had taken a bloody nose, losing so many aristocrats and the High Magus in a single day.  The chaos had only just begun.

Chuckling to himself, he teleported the Dark Sorcerers away from the building and back to the lair.  The other mission, the one he’d entrusted to his most favoured servant, would be complete by now.  In many ways, the attack on the Summer Palace had been a division.  And then the chaos would really start.

***
Robin watched in horror and helpless rage as the last of the Dark Sorcerers vanished in a flash of light.  They were fleeing, having accomplished their mission.  Behind them, the remaining defenders and the survivors of the massacre would have to rebuild, somehow.  Tiredly, he returned the sword to its sheath and then stopped.  Redrawing it, he stared down at the glowing blade, feeling its presence in his mind.

“Why?”  He asked, sadly, as if he expected the sword to answer.  “Why did this have to happen?”

Do you expect answers to all your questions?  A voice asked, in his head – or perhaps he was imagining it.  It was impossible to tell.  You have to stand on your own feet.

Shaking his head, he walked over and started to organise the few remaining defenders.  The flames rising from Waterford suggested that the town had been attacked as well, perhaps as a diversion to keep the garrison occupied.  And Tiffany…

This was supposed to be our wedding day, he thought, bitterly.  He walked into the ruined Summer Palace, hearing the cry for help from someone trapped within the building.  We should have been happy…

The body of the High Magus lay where it had fallen, guarded by an apprentice wizard who hadn’t taken any part in the battle.  Robin didn’t really blame him.  No one could be expected to fight Dark Sorcerers without proper training, but then, proper training hadn’t helped the High Magus…and without him, the House of Magus would be up for grabs.  Who knew who would come out on top in the coming power struggle?  The chaos would make it harder for Tiffany to rally the magicians against the Dark Sorcerers.

He felt the warm ring around his finger.  Tiffany had placed it there personally, binding him to her as solidly as she was bound to him.  And the Dark Sorcerers had set out to ruin their wedding…and they’d succeeded.  No one would ever feel safe again.  The Dark Sorcerers could strike anywhere.

Silently, he looked into the bright blue sky and vowed revenge.

Chapter Seventeen

The Tower of Camelot stood alone, for all that it was part of Merlin’s capital city.  It rose up into the sky, surrounded by wards that would have daunted even a Dark Sorcerer, providing a safe and secure prison for Merlin’s more powerful enemies.  Very few entered the Tower to emerge safely again, everyone knew; to be condemned to the Tower was to be condemned to death.  The prisoners were held under a personal charm that prevented escape and interrogated until they had spilled all of their secrets, and then they were ritually executed.  Everyone knew that the Tower of Camelot was impregnable – but then, like so many other buildings in Camelot, it had drawn its power from Merlin’s indomitable will.

Faye stood beneath a hood and watched the rain falling down around the Tower.  It was one of Merlin’s little jokes to give the Tower its own constant rainstorm – or perhaps it was part of the anchors that kept the wards in place – and it never failed to depress anyone looking at it.  Faye wasn't particularly concerned as she used her Sight to parse out the Tower’s defences.  With Merlin gone, the Privy Council had had to fall back on more ordinary magical wards, wards that could be broken or outsmarted or simply overpowered.  The guards she could see in the mist presented no real problem, but then they were there to serve as a tripwire.  The real defences would be deeper within the tower.

She pulled back her hood and allowed the rain to fall on her bare face.  Female magicians were rare, female sorcerers were rarely still – and there were no other female Dark Sorcerers.  Faye had turned to Dark Sorcery after an older and more powerful magician had left her face brutally scared, merely for daring to try to learn magic on her own – and she wanted revenge.  Her mind hadn’t been destroyed by Dark Sorcery, if only because she’d never been very stable in the first place.  The glamour surrounding her concealed her appearance, transforming the scarred girl into a desirable noblewoman.  They’d never see her as she truly was, until it was far too late.  Touching the amulet she wore under her shirt, she started forward towards the gates.  No one was permitted to enter without permission.  It was believed to be impossible for anyone to enter without permission.  Her lips tightened into a parody of a smile.  That bit of common knowledge would be broken today, along with the Tower of Camelot.

The gates loomed over her as she reached the portal, feeling spells crawling over the stone, somehow infused into the very material itself.  Merlin had known tricks no other magician had been able to match, but without his power to constantly replenish them, the spells were rapidly losing their effectiveness.  She reached under her shirt and held up her amulet, allowing the magic infused into the golden badge to touch the spells woven into the stone.  The gates opened slowly, with a dull rumbling sound, and she stepped through the first line of defences.  Faye wasn't fooled by the apparent ease of it all.  The next steps would be much harder.

She smiled as she walked up Dead Man’s Walk, up towards the guards standing in front of the second gate, the one that led right into the Tower.  Very few walked up the path and came down again, even now.  The friends and families of those held in the Tower preferred to keep their distance and swear that they knew nothing about whatever landed the prisoners in such hot water.  Mostly, their claims of innocence were shams, but it hardly mattered.  The guards stepped forward, weapons raised, and Faye held up the amulet.

There was no way of knowing how Maledict had managed to obtain the amulet permitting a single person access to the Tower.  Maledict kept his secrets well, knowing that one of his followers would try to unseat him soon enough.  Faye smiled as the guards saw the amulet and practically bowed and scraped as they opened the door, although that might have been because of the glamour.  She’d tuned it perfectly, ensuring that the guards not only saw feminine beauty, but also someone who had the power to exile them to one of the few hellhole postings in the Empire.  They might well have seen her as the Lady Tiffany herself!

Her stomach clenched as she passed through the wards and into the Tower of Camelot.  The entire building was crawling with spells, picking away at her magic field and hampering her ability to use magic.  A stone golem emerged from the shadows and lifted one rough hand, inviting her to follow it.  Faye watched the creature warily as it turned and started to head up the stairs, trying to ferret out the magical field within the Tower.  There was so much magic crackling on the air that her Sight was almost useless.  It was like staring into a blinding light.  

She touched one of the stone walls as they advanced up the stairs and saw a flash of blue light, flickering over her hand.  It was harmless, she suspected, yet there was something badly wrong about the whole building.  The magic field pressed in on her, pushing down on her mind, blocking out most of her abilities.  It shouldn’t have surprised her.  The Tower of Camelot had been built to hold powerful magicians and insane sorcerers.  Merlin wouldn't have relied upon his own power for that, not when there was a well of magic within the city itself.  He’d built his prison right on top of a well, tapping it to hold the prison in place and secure.

They reached the first level and started to walk down the stone corridor, allowing her to look left and right into each cell.  Most of the cells were empty, but a few held prisoners, each one sitting calmly and helplessly on a wooden bed.  There were no bars or even locks holding them in place, not when they were helpless to do anything, apart from obey orders. It was a neat system, she had to admit, if rather inhuman.  But then, everyone who had been brought into the Tower was guilty of inhuman crimes.  If Faye failed in her mission and was captured, she would find herself occupying one of the cells.  It wasn't a particularly comforting thought.  Only the awareness that returning without success would prove lethal kept her going onwards, into the darkened tower.

Light flared in the distance as they passed through a dimensional doorway, into another part of the Tower.  Merlin, she realised suddenly, had bent time and space in order to construct his prison.  If there was a serious attack on the prison, just as she intended to do, the Tower’s very internal structure would serve as a weapon against her.  If the amulet failed…she was likely to end up a prisoner herself, or dead.

The golem stopped outside a single cell.  This one was larger than the others, although lacking in creature comforts.  Faye stepped forward and peered through the doorway, seeing the man seated on the bed.  An unpleasant stench rose to her nostrils and she waved it away absently.  After everything she’d done to attain her powers, the smell shouldn’t have bothered her, but it did.  The man on the bed didn’t look up at her.

Duke Blackrock was tall and surprisingly handsome, without any of the physical degradation that accompanied the use of dark sorcery.  But then, the deadly games he’d played with children hadn’t been intended to attain power, but merely to indulge a perversion.  That, more than anything else, had amused Faye and her master.  The Duke could have expanded the handful of magical gifts he possessed, rather than simply indulge himself.  And now he was at Merlin’s mercy…or would have been, if Merlin was still within the world. Faye shared Maledict’s belief that Merlin was dead.  What kind of magician would give up power if there was any other choice?

She risked opening her Sight and saw a network of spells covering his body, holding him firmly within the cell.  Most of them were designed to control him without affecting anyone else, although a handful were general-purpose security spells.  If the Duke tried to leave the cell, the spells would hold him firmly in place; if anyone tried to force him out, the spells would turn on them too.  No one had ever escaped from the Tower of Camelot.  Carefully, Faye reached into her belt and produced her wand, angling it towards the golem.  The complex network of spells that kept the golem together had a single weakness, if she could just hit it before the golem realised that it was under attack…

Faye shaped the spell in her mind and blasted it into the golem.  For a second, its unchanging face almost looked surprised, before it crashed down into dust.  Merlin was no longer animating them by his magic, leaving them with nothing to draw on.  Even so, it had been a gamble.  Pushing the thought aside, she turned and ran into the cell, waving her wand ahead of her.  The network of spells that kept the Duke imprisoned wavered and started to collapse.  Faye whispered a Word of Power into the air and reality itself seemed to shimmer, just before the network of spells faded and vanished.  The Duke jumped upwards, as if someone had rammed a hot spike into his rear end, almost hitting Faye before he caught himself.  His eyes were wide and staring.  A few weeks in the Tower of Camelot would have felt like an eternity.  All things considered, the Duke had held up surprisingly well.

“Come on,” Faye snapped.  By now, the spells governing the Tower itself would be aware of their presence.  The amulet was glowing as it struggled to hold off the angry waves of power beating down on her, demanding to know who she was and why she was trying to break a prisoner free.  A normal magician could never have endured that battering, but Faye had planned carefully, designing her wards to absorb a terrible pounding before they finally collapsed.  “Move, now!”

The Duke didn’t argue; he followed her out of the cell and into the corridor.  Faye reached out with her Sight, risking blindness, to sense the corridor that led back to the Tower’s exterior.  The whole structure was altering around them, trying to trap them within an inescapable maze until the combat magicians arrived from the Iron Triangle.  Her lips tightened into a smile as the entire building locked down around them.  The guards would think that they had the upper hand and, normally, they would be right.  No one, not even a sorcerer, could teleport out of a pocket dimension.

She spoke another Word of Power into the air, shattering most of the spells binding the other prisoners in place.  The guards wouldn't realise that she already knew that she was trapped; indeed, some of the prisoners made her master look sane and reasonable.  Duke Blackrock would normally have never encountered this part of the magical world.  The guards would believe that she was trying to cause chaos…and they’d be right.  They wouldn't realise that the chaos would serve as a distraction.

Ignoring the howls of the newly-freed prisoners, she pulled the Duke further down the corridor.  Her Sight told her that the corridor had been twisted around; if they kept walking, she’d simply run back into the freed prisoners.  The normal laws of time and space didn’t operate very well within a pocket dimension.  Smiling to herself, she reached into her robes and produced her trump card, a Hand of Glory.  The Duke’s eyes went very wide when he saw it, knowing that even knowing the spells to produce a Hand of Glory were forbidden, on pain of death.  But with the Dark Sorcerers under a certain death sentence anyway, it hardly mattered.  They could only be killed once.

It felt…unpleasant in her hand, a cold piece of dead flesh waiting to be activated.  Maledict had cut it from the arm of one of his enemies – no shortage of those – and transfigured the fingers, turning them into candles.  He’d done other things too, invoking the darkest of magical spells to transform the hand into a powerful Object of Power, a key to any doorway in the world.  Faye held the Hand of Glory up into the air, whispered a spell that ignited the candles, and closed her eyes, feeling the spells bound into the Hand of Glory slowly coming to life.  The magic surrounding the Tower of Camelot pushed back, of course, but the Hand of Glory was coming to life and it would not be denied.  A powerful presence flared within the chamber, a small demon Maledict had trapped and bound to his service.  The Hand of Glory’s power shimmered out in front of her…

Keeping her eyes closed, she walked forward, through a door that had just appeared out of nowhere.  She felt the coldness of the world between dimensions, hearing things whispering deadly names outside the barriers of reality, just before she stepped through a second door.  Her Sight expanded suddenly until she could see the tangled web Merlin had constructed to shield his prison.  It was easy to find a way out of the pocket dimension and back into the real world.  The voices howled their anger as she passed through the doorway, leaving them behind.  Their words echoed in her head.

She opened her eyes and saw a pair of guards gaping at her, levelling their matchlocks at her face.  Faye shaped a deadly spell in her mind and turned both of them into flaming corpses, watching with gleeful pleasure as they died.  They hadn’t managed to summon a team of wizards to their aid, which meant that the main attack on the Summer Palace was working perfectly.  And who would imagine that an attack on the most important target of the year was a mere diversion?

The Duke’s hand was terrifyingly cold and Faye cursed her own mistake.  She’d kept her eyes closed, but he hadn’t – she hadn’t warned him to keep his eyes closed.  Anyone who saw the world between the worlds was flirting with madness, to say nothing of possession by any of the inhabitants.  She slapped him, hard, and was relieved to see some colour coming back to his cheeks.  Ignoring his gasps of pain, she pulled him with her down the corridor and out into the open air.  The rainfall had slowed to a light drizzle, for reasons she couldn’t even begin to imagine, unless it was a warning sign that the Tower of Camelot had been breached.  She might be right; Merlin hadn’t been known for being particularly subtle, but his successors didn’t have access to his vast power.

A line of guards were running towards the Tower, so Faye pulled the Duke in the opposite direction.  The guards shouted and levelled their weapons at her, but the bullets glanced off the shield she’d raised around both of them.  And then she was running through the wards, feeling them tightening around them and trying to force them back into the Tower of Camelot.  Desperately, she held up the Hand of Glory and triggered it one last time.  The strange energies of the Hand flared around her and the wards shattered.  As soon as she was outside the wards, she pulled the Duke to her and triggered a teleport spell.  The world went away in a flash of brilliant green light.

Maledict had given her specific orders as to what to do with the Duke.  Instead of returning him to Tara, she teleported them both to a safe house on the edge of one of the free cities, where they were met by two of Maledict’s other servants.  One of them gave her a potion that would restore her energy after the wards had tried to crush her powers; the other took care of the Duke, working complex charms that would ensure that the Duke would remain loyal to the Dark Sorcerers.  The Duke had been completely stripped of his mental defences in the Tower of Camelot, leaving him hopelessly vulnerable to their powers.  By the time he was returned to Tara, he’d be doing Maledict’s bidding – and he wouldn't be even remotely aware of it.  And his wife, Faye had been assured, would be grateful.  She would put the resources of an entire duchy behind the Dark Sorcerers.  Tara itself was small, but the Duke commanded other lands, scattered across the world.  With one daring rescue, Maledict had turned the balance of power on its head.

Shaking her head, she stood up and prepared to teleport back home.  By now, Maledict and the remaining Dark Sorcerers should have completed their attack on the Summer Palace and escaped, leaving behind a devastated government.  Merlin had always served as the linchpin of his own government; without him, who knew what would happen when the government faced an unexpected crisis?  Perhaps they’d even killed Lady Tiffany, Merlin’s lapdog…

She looked over at the Duke and smiled.  A few specific potions had helped clear his head and restore some semblance of health.  He’d be able to leave shortly, helping to add to the chaos gripping the country.  And then the government would fall, bringing in a new world of Dark Sorcery, where might made right.  And then she would have her revenge on all of those who had mocked her while she had been a weak and female magician.  

With that thought, she teleported out of the safe house and was gone.

Chapter Eighteen

The dead bodies stretched as far as the eye could see.

Tiffany stood, surrounded by three Knights of the Round Table, and watched bitterly as the forensic magicians did their work.  Each of the bodies was pulled out of the wreaked palace, checked for signs of dark magic that might turn them into zombies of other undead creatures, and then placed on the lawn to await burial.  The clerks working to identify the bodies were struggling; some of the bodies were so badly injured that it would take days of effort to identify them.  At least there was a list of who had been expected to attend the wedding.  Without it, some of the bodies might never have been identified.

She felt an insane urge to cry as the line of bodies grew longer.  It had been her wedding, the day that should have been her happiest on Earth.  Instead, it had been turned into a slaughterhouse by the Dark Sorcerers; hell, she wasn’t even sure if she was married.  They’d exchanged rings, but the ceremony hadn’t been completed.  The Archbishop of Canterbury would have to rule on the issue, once he recovered from his wounds.  God had to have protected him, if only because the curse that had struck him should have been lethal.

One of the forensic magicians waved her over and she walked slowly towards one of the bodies.  Even in death, there was no mistaking the High Magus; the real surprise was that there was something left to identify.  Magical duels, except when perfectly controlled, generally led to the loser being blown apart or transfigured beyond hope of recovery, but the High Magus’s body was unscathed.  He’d died in tremendous pain, yet his magic hadn’t consumed his body, which suggested that the Dark Sorcerer who had attacked him had successfully drained his power - and perhaps his memories too - before he died.

Tiffany kept her face expressionless as she removed his badges of office.  There was no sign of his wand, which wasn’t too surprising, yet the Dark Sorcerer had clearly not bothered to strip the body of its other badges.  The jewelled start that represented a seat in the House of Magus, the golden orb that signified power…both of them had been left in place, as if they weren’t important.  Tiffany shivered as she picked up the final badge and felt spells crawling over it, warning her that any attempt to use the gem to focus her own spells could cost her dearly.  The High Magus hadn’t just been an immensely powerful magician.  He’d combined the skills of wizardry and sorcery into one deadly package.

She wanted to weep for him, but she didn’t dare show weakness.  In life, she’d wondered about his loyalty – and if he would be consumed by the sorcerer’s desire for power that led so many to Dark Sorcery.  In death…there would be a power struggle in the House of Magus, as powerful magicians sought to claim his title for themselves.  The Dark Sorcerers, wittingly or otherwise, had shattered the Privy Council, at least until a new High Magus was appointed – and he might have his own ideas about the proper balance of power.  Merlin had kept the sorcerers in check through a mixture of bribery and intimidation.  Tiffany knew that she couldn’t do either of them.

A low cry of shock echoed in the air as the next set of dead bodies was dug out of the wreckage.  Children, barely old enough to walk on their own, hadn’t been permitted in the ballroom, where crying children would detract from the gravity of the scene.  Instead, they’d been in a playroom – and the Dark Sorcerers had broken in, slaughtering some of the children and mutilating others.  The entire Empire would be up in arms about the atrocity, yet anger would be mingled with fear.  If the Dark Sorcerers could carry out a successful raid, slaughtering Knights and Garrison soldiers as they pleased, what else could they do?

She walked closer to the dead bodies and, finally, allowed tears to slip down her cheeks.  One of the children, a girl no more than five years old, looked as if she was sleeping, but she was under the curse of endless sleep.  Tiffany had studied it back at Beneficence, where they’d learned about curses old and new.  The curse of endless sleep couldn’t be broken, save only by true love’s kiss – or, more practically, the sorcerer who’d cast it being forced to take the charm off the girl.  Tiffany saw the girl’s parents, weeping in the knowledge that their child was as good as dead, and wanted to pledge that the Dark Sorcerer who’d cast the spell would be hunted down and forced to reverse it.  She knew that it was a promise she couldn’t keep.

Her gaze moved away from the children – she couldn’t bear to look at them any longer – and towards the adult bodies.  Two Dukes – both strong supporters of the Privy Council – lay dead on the grass, surrounded by their retinue of armed guards and followers.  Many of their relations cast accusing looks at Tiffany, as if they blamed her personally for the crisis that had overtaken the Empire.  Others were clearly calculating their next step, now that the patriarch of their clan was dead.  One of the Dukes had left an acknowledged Heir, but the other hadn’t been so foresighted.  Tiffany shook her head, tiredly.  There would be another power struggle underway before the day came to an end.

The mangled – and unidentified – bodies lay at the edge of the gardens, as if no one wanted to get too close to them.  A couple looked as if they had been ritually flayed, a method used to obtain precise amounts of human flesh for the darkest of rituals.  Others had merely been blown apart, leaving little for the investigators to pierce together.  The Law of Similarity would allow the magicians to eventually identify them, but God alone knew if it would be enough for the grieving relations.  How many of them, she wondered darkly, would blame Tiffany for the disaster that had overtaken their families?  After all, it had been her wedding…

She looked up as she saw Robin advancing towards her.  Her husband – if he was her husband – looked tired and worn, covered in blood.  It wasn’t his, she could tell, yet it leant his armour a menacing appearance.  The other Knights of the Round Table drew back, allowing them some time alone, even though Tiffany was aware of their presence and of the small detachment of combat magicians that had arrived from the Garrison, too late to play any role in the fighting.  How many others would blame the Garrison for failing to protect them when the Dark Sorcerers attacked?

“Is this how it’s going to be from now on?”  Robin asked.  Tiffany had found herself lost for words, something that had been happening more and more frequently since Merlin had departed for parts unknown.  It was growing easier to believe that he’d died, or been killed, even though a magician powerful enough to match Merlin should have been detectable right around the globe.  Surely, Merlin wouldn't have allowed the Dark Sorcerers to run rampant if he’d known what was happening.  “I fought a demon in there – not some minor creature from the Greenwood, but a demon!”

Tiffany shrugged.  Without being quite aware that she’d moved, she found herself in his arms, hugging him tightly.  The smell of blood was horrific, but she ignored it.  All that mattered was that strong arms were holding her while she stood on the verge of collapse.  Robin put his arms around her and held her back, but he was clearly distracted.  His eyes had a distant look that didn’t surprise her.  She’d seen it before, when a handful of sorcerers had realised just how powerful Merlin truly was.  It was the mark of a person who had found themselves out of their depth.

“Without the Strictures of Sorcery in place, what can’t they do?”  Robin asked, pitching his voice low so that others couldn’t hear.  “They can release demons, summon monsters out of the Greenwood – perhaps even wash the wild magic through a city or town and command the monsters that survive their transformation.  They can teleport anywhere, launch their attacks and then get out again before reinforcements arrive.  They could be anywhere in the world…”

“We’ll find them,” Tiffany vowed.  She had never heard Robin on the verge of giving up before, but then…they’d ruined his wedding too.  Her mother, in one of her embarrassingly frank moments, had told her that young men were always nervous on their wedding night and might welcome enemy attack to avoid having to expose themselves to their wives.  The joke didn’t seem so funny now.  “Wherever they are, we will find them.”

She looked down at the glowing hilt at Robin’s belt.  “You fought a demon?”

“Excalibur fought a demon,” Robin said. He looked…daunted for a long moment.  “I’ve faced Greenwood monsters before – and creatures summoned by rogue magicians, but the demon was something else.  If it had been able to materialise properly on this plane, we would have been in the midst of another Kentigern.”

Tiffany rubbed her eyes and let go of him, slowly.  “I have faith that we will overcome this crisis,” she said, firmly.  It was hard to think straight, which was probably what the Dark Sorcerers were counting on, but they were effectively at war – and she, Merlin’s First Councillor, could declare a state of emergency.  Even the most bloody-minded aristocrat or independent-minded commoner wouldn’t refuse to accept a state of emergency, not after pulling so many bodies from the ruins of the Summer Palace.  The Iron Palace had been an accident, if a tragic and disastrous one; the Summer Palace was an act of war.  “They want us to be scared.  I won’t let them make us scared.”

A shadow fell over them and she looked up, into the golden eyes of a dragon.  Half of the dragons in England had been raced to the Summer Palace, a hundred beasts quartering the sky overhead and attempting to track any Dark Sorcerers who had remained in the area.  Tiffany doubted that they would be successful – the Dark Sorcerers could be on the other side of the world by now, in a single teleport bounce – but it would provide some reassurance to the soldiers and magicians sifting through the wreckage.  Oddly – unintelligent immature dragons were dangerous beasts with large appetites and a habit of stealing cattle if unfed – she felt a flicker of reassurance from the golden eyes. She dismissed it a second later.  It was probably nothing more than her imagination.

Robin drew Excalibur and held it up in front of her.  The glow from the sword was somehow reassuring as well, even though she wasn’t sure how far Excalibur could be trusted.  No one knew who had forged the sword, or given it to the Lady of the Lake for King Arthur, but it was an Object of Power.  And no Object of Power, particularly one with a mind of its own, could be completely trusted.  Merlin had drummed that into her head, time and time again.  There were books back at Beneficence that were effectively Objects of Power in their own right – and people who read them were forever changed by the experience, or dead.

“We can prevail,” Robin said.  Even his voice was different when he held the sword unsheathed.  “We shall prevail.”

Tiffany, more worried than she wanted to admit, took his hand and held it tightly.

***
An hour later, a flash of green light announced the arrival of a sorcerer, teleporting right into the midst of chaos.  Robin had Excalibur in his hand before his mind had quite registered the arrival of the sorcerer, the humming blade swinging around to cover the target.  The sorcerer, wearing the black robes patterned with the white of a messenger, looked startled at the reception.  Robin scowled as he stamped over to greet him.  He should have known better.

“I have an urgent message from Camelot for the Lady Tiffany,” the sorcerer announced.  It had to be urgent.  Few sorcerers volunteered for communications duty and those that did often resented having to carry routine messages.  Any magician could send messages with the proper training; the only reason to send a teleporting sorcerer was security.  The sender wanted no one else to read the message.  “Where is she, my good man?”

Robin fought down the rage that threatened to overcome him.  “She’s counting the dead bodies,” he said, coldly.  Didn’t the sorcerer even recognise him as the Lady Tiffany’s husband – assuming that they were legally married, of course – or even Excalibur itself?  “If you’ll come with me…”

The sorcerer looked unbothered by the hundreds of dead bodies as they picked their way back into the wreaked palace.  A team of engineers from the Garrison swore that some of the building was still viable, although Robin had his doubts.  If they hadn’t needed to find a place to put all of the bodies, at least until they could be released to their heirs, he would have talked Tiffany out of going back indoors.  The sorcerer followed him into the building, glancing uneasily towards the spot where Robin had fought the demon.  A sorcerer often made questionable bargains with the Darkness and developed a sense for demonic presences.  The chances were that the demon’s mere presence, if only for a few minutes, had permanently blighted the land.

Tiffany looked up from consulting with a pair of priests from Waterford.  There had been a surprisingly large church in the town, allowing Tiffany to call upon the priests for Last Rites for some of the dying.  Even Healers hadn’t been able to save some of the ones struck by terrible curses.  Excalibur glowed warmly in Robin’s hand, promising justice if not revenge.  Robin looked at his bride and saw just how brutally tired she was.  They’d made no plans for a honeymoon, but he promised himself that he would take her back to bed and make sure that she slept properly before she addressed the Houses of Parliament.  It would not do to have her fall asleep while trying to convince the MPs to back her request for a state of emergency.

“I bring a sealed message for you, My Lady,” the sorcerer said, producing a glass ball from beneath his robes.  It glowed with strange magic, ensuring that only the person for whom the message was intended could open it and read the message inside.  Robin knew that some of the Knights of the Round Table – and their attached combat magicians – had long suspected that the communications spells were compromised.  It seemed that the Tribunal shared the same suspicion.  “I suggest that you open it at once.”

“Thank you,” Tiffany said.  She took the globe with a gloved hand and placed the other hand, without a glove, against the glass.  Instantly, the ball’s glow spread up her arm and surrounded her, allowing her to hear the message in privacy.  Robin waited, watching her face carefully.  The news wasn’t good news.  Slowly, the glow faded away, leaving Tiffany alone.  “Can you take a message back?”

“Of course, My Lady,” the sorcerer said.  He sounded mildly affronted at the suggestion that he couldn’t enchant the ball with a new message.  “What message do you wish me to carry?”

“Inform the Sorcerer Black” – Robin’s eyes went wide; the Sorcerer Black was the feared leader of the Tribunal – “that I would like to speak with him as soon as we return to Camelot,” Tiffany said.  “I’ll hitch a lift back with the Dragon Mistress Eleanor.”

“Understood,” the sorcerer said.  “I will carry the message personally.”

He nodded to Robin and then stepped back, muttering a spell under his breath.  There was another flash of green light and he was gone.  Robin looked over at Tiffany and frowned.  She looked badly shaken, even after having her wedding ruined by Dark Sorcerers and nearly becoming the victim of a kidnap plot.  In fact, she looked, for a moment, as tired as he felt.

“Bad news,” she said, as soon as she’d drawn a spell around them, safeguarding their privacy.  Robin felt the spell’s effects and nodded to himself.  The spell was easy to circumvent, but it was impossible without alerting the person inside.  “That was a message from the Tribunal.  The Tower of Camelot has been breached and…lost.”

Robin stared at her.  “Lost?”

“The Tower of Camelot’s internal dimensions have always been a bit fluid,” Tiffany said, grimly.  “Merlin intended to make it impossible for anyone to escape, no matter how powerful they were; if there was trouble, the doorways linking the interior of the Tower to the exterior would collapse, trapping the prisoners in a room with no doors and no way out.  The wards were so powerful that no one, not even a powerful sorcerer, could be sure of opening a doorway into the pocket dimension.”

Robin nodded.  Pocket dimensions were a favourite spell for both sorcerers and wizards, for they could be used to store anything in a very private space.  One sorcerer could open up a link to another’s pocket dimension, but only if he knew the coordinates and the right spells to get through the wards without destroying the dimension or suffering blowback into his own realm.  And as a prison, it was hard to beat a dimension that could only be accessed by the authorities, operating from the correct location.  As always, Merlin’s sheer power had been able to force through tricks that no lesser mage had been able to copy.

He rubbed his eyes, tiredly.  “Who did they try to free?”

“We’re not sure,” Tiffany admitted.  “The intruder somehow broke out of the Tower and escaped, taking a prisoner with him.  But all of the witnesses who saw the prisoner clearly are dead.  We don’t know who was freed and they can’t get back into the Tower to count heads.  By now, the prisoners will probably have killed each other before they realised that they were trapped.”

Robin stared down at his hands.  “The Tower of Camelot was supposed to be invulnerable,” he said, slowly.  But then, it had been Merlin’s magic that made it invulnerable.  Without him, the impregnable prison had been penetrated.  “If they can break into the Tower…”

Tiffany nodded.  “They can break into anything,” she agreed.  “God help us all.”

Chapter Nineteen

Maledict stood on a ruined building, looking down.

Below him, the Dark Sorcerers were celebrating.  A hundred captives had been taken, mainly young, pretty and female, and the Dark Sorcerers had bound them with controlling spells before turning them loose and using them as slaves.  The more powerful and experienced Dark Sorcerers had little interest in anything apart from power – even sex – but the newcomers were abusing the girls in any way they liked.  Power was a heady experience for those who had never touched it before they’d discovered their magical gifts and allowed them to be perverted; they allowed themselves to be corrupted by it, gleefully.  Besides, it would add another nail in their coffin if they were ever caught by Merlin’s lapdogs.

He watched dispassionately as two noblewomen were forced to run through the fire naked, while the Dark Sorcerers laughed and placed bets on the outcome.  Both of the girls were largely worthless as hostages – if only they’d caught the Lady Tiffany – and allowing his followers to slake themselves on the two girls would reward them for their efforts.  By the time the girls were finally sacrificed to the Darkness, they’d view it as a relief and go willingly into the hands of the demons.  It would only give their sacrifice extra value.

And yet, he was brooding.

Maledict knew himself to be powerful.  In fact, he was almost certainly the most powerful sorcerer in the world, now that Merlin was gone.  Few sorcerers who didn’t touch dark sorcery could hope to match him for power – and he’d be able to sense their presence, just as they could sense his presence if it hadn’t been muffled by the Greenwood or the ruined city.  And yet, the High Magus had come alarmingly close to defeating him in a duel.  He’d been more powerful and…only clashing his magic field directly into the High Magus had won the fight.  If he’d lost the battle…

It didn’t take much imagination to guess what would have happened then.  With their leader dead, the Dark Sorcerers would have started scrabbling over who should be leader, while the High Magus and his cronies wiped out any of them that didn’t flee fast enough.  The Battle of the Summer Palace would have turned into a disaster, even if they did capture Lady Tiffany and free Duke Blackrock from his cell.  And Maledict didn’t care what happened in a world without him.  All that mattered was his power and his survival.

He was sure that it was possible to make himself immortal.  Merlin had certainly lived for a very long time, even if he hadn’t been as immortal as everyone had thought – and even magicians could extend their lifespan using magic and potions.  But that wasn't immortality, or anything else to immortality, and coming so close to defeat had forced Maledict to concentrate on the possibility that he might be defeated and killed in the future.  And then all the questionable bargains he’d made over the years, to obtain and maintain his powers, would come due.  Maledict had seen enough of the hellfire to know that he wanted to put off his death as long as possible.

The High Magus had been weaker than him, he was certain.  A sorcerer who hadn’t fallen to madness wouldn’t gain the powers of a Dark Sorcerer, even if they were relatively sane.  And yet he’d almost won, because he’d understood the basis of magic far better than Maledict had thought possible.  Maledict had never attended one of the magical colleges, even before he’d started embracing the Darkness and become a Dark Sorcerer.  It had quite simply never occurred to him that the colleges would have anything useful to teach him.

It wasn’t hard to understand why Merlin had created the colleges in the first place.  Humans with magical talents were far from uncommon – and some of them could be very dangerous, either to others or to themselves.  Merlin’s academies of magic allowed him to ensure that most were steered towards wizardry, rather than the far more dangerous sorcery, and kept most of the magicians fairly loyal to him.  Wizards never risked tearing open new channels in their minds and expanding their powers, but they were far more capable of using what little they did have with a subtlety that was alien to Maledict and most of the Dark Sorcerers.  Raw power could always overcome them, yet even dark sorcery had its limits.

A great shout went up from below as one of the captured women finally caught fire and started to burn to death.  She wanted to run, but the spells binding her wouldn't let her escape, leaving her trapped in the flames.  The Dark Sorcerers laughed and snickered at her plight, enjoying her suffering as if it were the finest of wines.  Maledict smiled to himself, knowing the truth.  At some point, they’d passed beyond committing atrocities because they were necessary to gain power and reached a stage where they committed atrocities because they were fun.  To a Dark Sorcerer, mundane humans – even weaker magicians – were nothing more than toys, in the hands of a playful child.  And toys were often broken…

Maledict concentrated, sending out a summoning.  Most of the Dark Sorcerers had never been through any of the colleges, but a handful had studied before being forced to flee.  Some had pushed the limits too far too fast, others had believed that the teachers were deliberately holding them back – and one had been pushed out by her fellow students.  Faye flew through the air, laughing as her long dark hair streamed out behind her in the wind, and landed neatly in front of her master.  She went down on her knees, a gesture of respect that had its origins in a fabled land of dark sorcery, destroyed by Merlin centuries ago.

Even with her scars – and the degradation wreaked by dark sorcerer – she was striking, Maledict acknowledged.  Some of the newcomers had seen her as little more than a servant, or a whore, and had tried to force her into their beds. Faye had killed one of them, transfigured the second into a screaming statue and broken the mind of the third.  Maledict didn’t care; the more his subordinates fought one another, the less they thought about trying to overthrow him and claim his power for themselves.  Sorcerers rarely worked well together – even those who hadn’t embraced dark sorcery – but it had been known to happen.  The alliances often fell out very quickly afterwards, but that was little consolation to the leader they’d defeated.  He was, if he were lucky, dead.

“Master,” Faye said.  Her voice was respectful, even submissive, but Maledict knew better than to take it on trust.  Faye, like the others, would be watching for a sign of weakness before she tried to stab a knife in his back.  A female dark sorcerer would have problems governing the males – dark sorcerer was all about unleashing the primal instincts of mankind – but Faye could, if any woman could.  She was powerful, dangerous, and right on the verge of madness.  It would take a braver man than most of the Dark Sorcerers not to fear her.

“Faye,” Maledict said, shortly.  “You were at Beneficence, were you not?”

Faye bowed her head in agreement.  She’d studied there – one of the few women to be accepted into any college – and had shown promise, too much promise for some of the other pupils.  There was always a degree of hazing in the colleges – young magicians often picked fights with each other, purely to set up a pecking order – but Faye had been hazed until she’d snapped and fled the college, after killing one of her tormentors with a spell right out of a forbidden tome.

“You were given a through grounding in the basic elements of wizardry,” Maledict continued.  “I wish you to tell me everything you were taught.”

He watched Faye’s mind ticking over, seeking an advantage for her own ambitions.  She wouldn't know just how badly prepared Maledict was, unless she guessed when she started trying to teach him.  And then, she wouldn't breathe a word of it to anyone else.  It would be an advantage to her, one that would lose its potency if everyone knew about it.

“Yes, Master,” she said, finally.  “When do you want to begin?”

Down below, a trumpet sounded as the Dark Sorcerers finished their calibration and prepared for the sacrifice.  The remaining prisoners were herded forward until they were standing in one of the pools of corruption left behind by the demon who had rampaged through the city, infernal energies shimming out of nowhere and stroking their bodies with malicious glee.  He watched as the prisoners began to scream, crying out for salvation that would never come.  By the time the final stage began, they’d devote themselves to Satan if that was what it took to save them.  And it would damn them to the deepest pits of Hell.

“Soon,” Maledict said.  He chuckled darkly as one of the prisoners collapsed in the infernal fires, her body seemingly unhurt while the flames burned away at her soul.  “Once the sacrifice is complete, I have to make a trip south.  We will start when I return.”

His mouth shaped into something that could charitably be called a smile.  “And then you will tell me everything you know about the defences of Beneficence,” he added, feeling a dark exultation spreading through his very bones.  All the prizes he had never dared to reach for and claim for himself when Merlin was alive were within his grasp now.  “I think we will soon claim it for ourselves.”

“Yes, Master,” Faye said.

Drawing a stone knife from beneath his robes, Maledict leapt into the air and floated down to where the sacrifices were screaming and begging for mercy.  Their torment was almost a fine wine to the Dark Sorcerers, who were drawing on it to expand their own powers.  With a gesture, he commanded the first of the sacrifices to be brought to him and placed on the stone alter.  The girl, barely old enough to bear children, stopped screaming – until she saw the knife.  Held down by binding spells, all she could do was scream and scream as he brought down the knife, savouring her every second of torment, until he finally started to cut her flesh.  Blood dripped down and pooled under the stone altar, a heady brew for the Dark Sorcerers.  The girl screamed and screamed until he finally ended her life.  By that point, her sanity was long gone.

Maledict shaped a spell with his mind and summoned some of her blood into the air.  Dark sorcery, powered by the infernal energies, shaped and transfigured the blood, transforming it into an intimate part of a dark rite.  He took the transfigured blood – now with the consistency of jelly – and pressed it against his bare chest, shaping ritual marks on his flesh.  Power flared through him and he laughed aloud, allowing the remains of sanity to slip away into the darkness.  Even Merlin hadn’t known the joys of drawing power through a necromantic rite.

The Dark Sorcerers pressed forward until he stopped them with a glare.  Pressing his hands against the dead girl’s chest, he whispered words in a long-forgotten tongue, dedicating the sacrifice – and the girl’s soul – to his demonic ally.  A second wave of power, stronger than the first, flared through his mind and he rode it, allowing it to reshape his mind at will.  Laughing, he stepped back and watched as infernal flames consumed the body, destroying all traces of the girl.  No one would ever know what had happened to her.

“Begin,” he commanded.

As one, the remaining captives were sacrificed.  Maledict stood at the heart of the power, sharing it out among his disciples.  They joined him in the blissful abandonment of all scruples and drew on the power, united in their dark cause.  Today, they had killed hundreds of men and women who had stood in their way; tomorrow, the world would belong to them.  And then their lives would become those of gods, taking whatever they wanted and treating the entire world as a toy.  There would be enough for all of them…

He stepped back, drawing on his power.  The dark ritual would continue until the last dregs of power had been absorbed by one of his sorcerers, but there was no longer any need for his presence.  It was easy to shape the teleport spell in his mind and he vanished in a flash of green light, rematerialising halfway across the country.  He stood in the midst of the village they’d attacked and slaughtered, a day before Merlin had departed – or died.  The handful of guards the Duke had left there reached for their weapons, their faces contorted with panic, and he froze them with a casual spell.  He could have killed them, easily, but he still needed the Duke.

“Forget,” he ordered.  Their eyes went blank as a chunk of their memory vanished.  By the time they recovered, he would be long gone and they would have no memory of his visit – until it was far too late.  He cast about with his Sight, seeking any traces that he was being watched from a distance, and saw nothing.  The Duke clearly had better uses for his magicians then watching an empty village.  He was, of course, quite wrong.

Chuckling to himself, Maledict started to walk up towards the Greenwood.  Three weeks ago, it had been a hard walk.  Dark sorcery was hard on the body and he’d moved like a man of ninety years old, barely able to remain upright.  Now, he drew on the vast reserves of power he had taken from the dying girl and strode confidently forward, barely even aware of the effort until he reached the boundary line.  He stopped and probed it carefully with his Sight.  Merlin had linked the boundary lines to the wellsprings and streams of power that dotted the countryside, yet it was clear to him that the boundary lines were weakening.  Soon they would collapse and usher in a new era of wild magic, where sorcerers would be gods and mundane people their servants – if they chose to let them live.  Maledict wasn’t scared of the Faerie, or the Elves, or any of the other dark creatures lurking beyond the Greenwood, in Avalon.  He could hold them all at bay.  Their very presence would help terrify the common folk into submission.

Crossing the boundary line, he kept walking.  The wild magic within the Greenwood was stronger than he recalled, more potent.  Few magicians could hope to tap the wild magic, but one day, Maledict was sure, he would reach a level of knowledge and experience that would allow him to command the uncontrollable magic.  And then let the Faerie and Elves beware.  He drew in his Sight as he walked down to the clearing near the lake, smiling at the reminder of the ritual they’d conducted back when they were scared of Merlin, and then emitted a mental call.  Slowly, cautiously, the creatures of the Greenwood gathered around him.

Maledict smiled and some of them, remembering their long-lost humanity, shivered.  Many of them had been human once, before they’d been transfigured by wild magic and forced to remain in the Greenwood.  Others were creatures of miscegenation, creatures born from parents who had both been transfigured by the wild magic, but in different ways.  A handful had even refused to enter Avalon and had chosen to remain in the Greenwood, perhaps hoping to recapture the affinity they’d once felt for humanity.  But that had been a long time ago, before Merlin, the devil’s son.

Had Merlin understood, Maledict wondered, just how much suffering he’d caused over the centuries?  Few chose to be transformed by wild magic, yet Merlin had confined them all to the Greenwood, with local villagers stoning them every time they dared show their faces.  Within the Greenwood, where time ran fluid and a man could step over a thousand years in a split second, they had nursed their resentments for a very long time.  They hated the pure humans and wanted revenge.  How could anyone blame them?

“Merlin is gone,” Maledict said.  He didn’t try to charm his words to encourage belief or submission.  This was the Greenwood and a simple charm like that would be drowned out by the wild magic.  Besides, they would have felt his departure.  “Merlin is gone…and his Empire is vulnerable as never before. This very day, I struck at the heart of the remains of the Empire and slaughtered much of its ruling class.  I will overthrow the rulers and take it for myself.”

He allowed them to sense the truth in his words.  “I offer you a chance for revenge,” he said.  “Over the years, you have been driven further and further from your human roots, forced into the Greenwood by Merlin’s charms.  Now is your chance to take it back from those who forced you to hide.  The Kingdom of Merlin is at your mercy.

“Join me and help me to overthrow the remains of the Empire.  I will grant you freedom to roam where you will, to live as the humans you are…and to take revenge on those who condemned you.  You are mighty and they fear you – why not give them a reason to fear you as you feared them?  Join me and take a whole new world!”

The transformed creatures discussed it amongst themselves.  Not all of them were interested, but enough were to provide a powerful army of monsters that all feared.  The Duke who thought he owned these lands would be in for a nasty surprise, now that the boundary lines were weakening.  There would be little trouble in helping the monsters to escape and then unleashing them against an unsuspecting world.  He waited patiently for their answer.

Finally, over four hundred monsters accepted his offer.  Maledict smiled as he shook hands with their leader, a once-man named Thorn.  With a little careful preparation, his new army could be transported to its next target, one that would please the Duke and his allies.  The Free City of Londinium.

And then, waiting for him like a ripe plum, Beneficence – and Camelot itself

Chapter Twenty

Lucas shook helplessly.

He’d never realised just how ruthless his father could be before.  No, that wasn't entirely true; he’d seen how ruthless his father could be with the peasants who owed him their fealty.  But then, they were just peasants whose lives belonged to his father, who could dispose of them as he saw fit.  Indeed, his father was a kinder master than the Duke of Tchernobog, who had been known to hunt peasants on horseback and kill the ones who failed to run fast enough.  Lucas cared little for their thoughts – but the aristocracy was quite another matter.  His father had encouraged the Dark Sorcerers to strike at – and kill – members of the aristocracy.

How could he have risked so much?  Two Dukes were dead, along with over two dozen Lords, Earls and Courts.  The deaths from the House of Commons weren't important – Lucas fully shared his father’s belief that the House of Commons had been getting more and more uppity over the last hundred years and it was time to slap it down hard – but they’d come alarmingly close to assassinating or capturing Lady Tiffany herself.  And then…they’d nearly killed Emma!

He lifted his head, hearing the quiet sniffles from the next room.  Emma had collapsed the moment the Dark Sorcerers had retreated, leaving behind a wreaked palace and hundreds of dead bodies.  The Healers his father had called in had been unable to do much for her, besides suggesting that they be allowed to perform a memory charm that would ensure that she remembered nothing of the battle.  Lucas, who had been horrified at how reluctant his father had been to call in the Healers, had refused, even convincing his father.  Or perhaps his father, who believed firmly in toughening up his children by any means necessary, had chosen not to accept their suggestion.  It certainly made more sense than him finally deciding to listen to his son and Heir.

Emma hadn’t stopped breaking down into tears ever since they’d returned to Camelot.  Lucas cared for little, but he did care for his sister and watching her collapse wasn't a pleasant experience.  And his father had put her life – both of their lives – at risk.  It was utterly unforgivable, and yet he didn’t dare express his horror and rage to his father.  The Duke wouldn't hesitate to punish his son for speaking out against him.

He wanted to step into Emma’s room and promise her that it was going to be all right, but he couldn’t.  His father had given his sister privacy charms, although Lucas was sure that his father could override them at will, and Lucas didn’t have the key to enter the room.  Her maids could enter, but spellbound as they were, they wouldn't be able to help her.  They’d carry out her orders unless her father countermanded them – and would leave her alone if she commanded, even if it wasn't what she needed.  Lucas clenched his fists as the sound of weeping grew louder.  What good was he if he couldn’t even help his own sister?

The Duke hadn’t bothered to raise his children himself.  That would have taken him away from politicking.  Instead, he’d left them to be raised by a series of tutors, all carefully chosen for their grasp of etiquette and inability to teach what a young Heir really needed to know.  Lucas’s father had gained his Duchy through overthrowing his own father and he had no wish to encourage his own son to do likewise.  Instead, Lucas had delved into the heroic tales of the past, from the search for the Holy Grail to the final charge of the Serpent Wars.  Few of the stories had any resemblance to reality, but that hardly mattered to him.  All that mattered was that the stories were exciting.  He’d used to fancy himself a knight in shining armour, yet his father had constantly forbidden him to attempt to gain a knighthood through serving in the Garrison.  It was not right and proper for a young Heir to risk himself in combat, his father had said, and closed the subject.  And now Lucas couldn’t even help his own sister.

He remembered being envious when he’d heard that Sir Robin – the commoner-born Sir Robin – had been granted Excalibur by the Lady of the Lake.  How could she have given the sword to a commoner, unless he was worthy to bear it – and could Sir Robin be truly worthy?  He had to be if he’d been granted the most famous sword in all of history.  Lucas would have given up anything, even the Duchy, to be in his place – and yet he still couldn’t help his own sister.  Sir Robin, he was sure, would have managed it without breaking a sweat.

A cough brought him back to himself and he looked up sharply, one hand falling to his sword.  He’d been wearing full armour even indoors, cursing the weight, but knowing that the protection would be vital if the Dark Sorcerers struck at his father.  Yes, they’d made a bargain with him, through the services of Lucas’s half-brother, but Dark Sorcerers were noticeably erratic.  One of them might break the bargain merely because he thought it would be funny.  Or, perhaps, they’d decide that the Duke had outlived his usefulness and betrayed him before he could betray them.

He scowled when he saw the messenger standing there, wearing his father’s livery.  It was uncommon to use messengers in Camelot’s lordly mansions, but his father had always enjoyed showing off his wealth and power.  Besides, a spellbound messenger was much more reliable than a message sent by magic, even by the Duke’s loyal magicians.  The House of Magus plotted and schemed against one another constantly and they’d developed spells for unlocking and cracking every known encryption spell.  A message in a locked head was far more secure.

“My Lord,” the messenger said, in the flat voice that signified that he was merely relaying a message from someone else, “your father requests your presence in the study.”

Demands, more like, Lucas thought, sourly.  His father wouldn't need him for anything, he was sure.  It was more likely that he was trying to drag Lucas away from his sister in hopes of toughening him up.  After all, Lucas would inherit the Duchy – and his sister would be married off as soon as she could bear children, to someone carefully picked to expand the family’s power and influence.  Emma had used to speak of finding true love, but it wouldn't happen.  She had no value to her father other than as a brood mare.

“I understand,” Lucas said.  He kept the messenger waiting for a long moment, and then sighed inwardly.  What was the point of tormenting a man who was merely passing on a message?  “Inform my father than I will wait on him presently.”

Taking one last moment to listen to Emma – and noting with some relief that the sobbing had trailed off, to be replaced by choked snores – Lucas turned and walked down the corridor, passing a chain of guardsmen as he walked.  They struck their breastplates in salute, although Lucas knew that they’d kill him in an instant if his father commanded it.  His father had been bringing in more and more guardsmen to Camelot, as if he expected to have to fight for his life – or to take the city for himself.  He wasn't the only one; the population of Camelot had tripled over the past week, with thousands of extra guardsmen and servants being shipped into the city.  Everyone knew that it was just a matter of time before all hell broke loose, perhaps literally.  The power struggle in the House of Magus had only just begun.

His father had set up duplicates of his study in each and every one of his properties.  It was a luxuriously decorated room, with fine drapery, a selection of wines and more security spells than Lucas had seen anywhere else, outside of the Iron Palace while Merlin had been present.  Even his small talent for magic could sense the deadening effect of the spells, crawling over the building and blocking all attempts by seers to peer through the defences and spy on the Duke.  His father had once commented that all of the aristocracy spied on one another constantly and that there was a quiet, but very lethal war underway to develop and deploy new spying spells before counter-surveillance spells caught up with the latest development.  He’d spent several fortunes making his personal space as secure as possible.  It couldn’t have kept out Merlin, but then, Merlin was gone.

Lucas nodded to his father and bowed to his guests, surprised to see them entering the Duke’s mansion without demanding a meeting on neutral ground.  Duke Vlad of Carpathia was a tall man, so inhumanly thin that some people whispered that he had vampire blood somewhere back along the family tree – or that he was a vampire himself.  Lucas discounted the latter rumour on principle, knowing that the wards his father had designed to protect the mansion would keep out vampires and other forms of supernatural vermin, but he had to admit that the Duke was an alarming personality.  His eyes, tinted red after a magical attack had come very close to assassinating him, never failed to unnerve his enemies.

Duke Olav of Tchernobog was the real surprise, a young swarthy man with a cruel face, pockmarked by sores from a disease he’d caught when he was a child.  Tchernobog was infested by all kinds of supernatural creatures and some of them spread disease, even infecting the Heir to the Duchy.  It was no surprise that the past Dukes had been strong supporters of Merlin and the Privy Council – without the boundary lines, Tchernobog would have been overrun by the Greenwood centuries ago – but Duke Olav’s father had died in the attack on the Summer Palace.  He was a young inexperienced man, perfect for Lucas’s father to manipulate how he pleased.

The other three guests were less surprising, although Lucas wondered at his father inviting them to the meeting.  One, Lord Randolph, was that rarity, a commoner whose father had been ennobled by Merlin himself.  He was one of the largest factory owners in the world, with interests everywhere and a fortune that outshone much of the aristocracy.  The second, the Sorcerer Harm, had a bad reputation, even though he hadn’t been dabbling in dark sorcery.  His position in the House of Magus and unquestioned power kept his enemies from whispering too many unpleasant things about him behind his back.  The third, Baron Darling of Ewing, controlled some of the lands between Effrul and Camelot.  He had long resented his submission to Merlin and had often been on the verge of losing his title and lands.

“Hey, Lucas,” Olav said.  They’d been friends once, enjoying many nights together between studying – when they hadn’t been able to ditch their tutors.  Olav’s reputation for cruelty – and carnality - was well-founded.  “Glad to see you.”

“Take your seat,” his father said, brusquely.  “We have much to discuss and very little time to make plans and permanent arrangements.”

He strode over to the chart on the wall and tapped it, meaningfully.  “Tomorrow, Lady Tiffany intends to address the Houses of Parliament and request a state of emergency,” he said.  “A few of my allies have been delaying matters, pushing to see just how far she was prepared to push things.  Her reluctance to force the issue forward suggests that she is weaker than we dared hope.  Merlin’s backing no longer exists.”

His smile darkened.  “It’s time we faced facts,” he said.  “Merlin is gone and he’s not coming back.”

There was a long moment of silence.  Lucas could understand their feelings.  Merlin had been the centre of the Pendragon Empire for so long that being without him was almost unimaginable. And yet – the collapse of the Iron Palace and the attack on the Summer Palace suggested that Merlin, if he was still alive, had lost interest in ruling.  And if he were dead…all sorts of possibilities began to open up, for those with the will to seize them for themselves.

“We do not know that he is dead,” Baron Darling pointed out, calmly.  “He may be taking a long vacation and planning to return to us…”

“Unlikely,” Lucas’s father said.  “In all of his years in this world, Merlin only ever retired to the Summer Palace.  He showed little interest in visiting the lands our ancestors conquered for him.  And he just vanished.  I think we were wrong to believe that he is – was – immortal.  I think that his years caught up with him, just as they did to the Sorcerer Wilde.”

There were nods from around the table.  Wilde had been a talented sorcerer with enough discipline to preserve his sanity – and power – for nearly two hundred years.  Eventually, however, his spells had weakened and old age caught up with him, aging him to death in a handful of hours.  His body had collapsed to dust long after he’d passed beyond the point of no return.  And Merlin had lived for over five times as long as the Sorcerer Wilde.

“The alternative is to believe that someone killed him,” the Duke continued.  “And yet…we have not sensed the presence of a sorcerer with that much power.  Merlin was unique; no one ever managed to convince the Lord Below to have more children.  He’s gone – and we won’t see him again.  And that means that we have to start thinking about the future. The Privy Council cannot rule forever.”

“I think I know where this is going,” the Sorcerer Harm said.  “You believe that we should be ruling in their place.”

“Exactly,” Lucas’s father said.  If he was upset by Harm jumping right to the point, it didn’t show in his voice or face.  But then, he had always been an accomplished dissembler.  “We represent continuity – that was why our ancestors were chosen in the first place.  Who do you believe would do a better job of running the Empire?  Those who have the training and experience to think in the long term – to plan for the good of the Empire - or those who depend on being elected by a fickle population into power, and who must pander to the commoners to remain in power?”

“Not all of us have bloodlines stretching all the way back to King Arthur,” Lord Randolph pointed out, mildly.  “Indeed, my own father was one of those commoners you so despise.”

“And yet, Merlin saw fit to ennoble him,” Lucas’s father said.  “I believe that Merlin’s judgement was always sound.  You are one of us.”

“And Merlin also appointed the Privy Council,” the Sorcerer Harm said.  “Do you refuse to accept his judgement in that particular section?”

Lucas’s father ignored the quiet mockery in his tone.  “The Privy Council was set up to provide day-to-day governance of the Empire,” he said, coldly.  “Merlin thought in the long term, but the Privy Council…cannot.  They have simply too many crisis points to face in the next few weeks to provide effective long-term governance.”

He leaned forward.  “And the Lady Tiffany is married to a commoner,” he added, darkly.  “You know how Thomas Cromwell has been pushing for reform over the past five years; you know how he wants to strip power from the House of Lords and vest it in the House of Commons.  If we allow the Privy Council to have free reign, we will wake up one day to discover that we have been stripped of power and marginalised.  How long will any of us last if Cromwell does manage to push through his Reform Act?”

Lucas watched their faces, shaking his head inwardly.  Thomas Cromwell had been pushing for a near-complete reform in how the Empire was governed, including weakening the positions of the aristocrats, freeing the peasants from the land and giving the commoners – even the ones living in the aristocratic lands – the vote.  No one had any illusions about what would happen next.  Even the most liberal aristocrat was despised by most of his peasants.  The steady stream of escapes to the free cities proved that.  Give them the vote and the aristocrats would find themselves voted out of houses and land.  It was an intolerable thought.

“The fact remains that there is no clear procedure for…removing a Privy Councillor,” Duke Vlad pointed out, mildly.  “We have always had to put up with whatever dotty halfwit Merlin insisted on placing on the Council.  I don’t think he wanted us mice voting to bell the cat.”

“But if she were to lose a vote of confidence,” Lord Randolph said, slowly, “she’d have no choice, but to resign and return to Shalott with her commoner husband.”

Lucas’s father nodded, triumphantly.  “And if she were to lose a vote in all three Houses of Parliament, she’d definitely have to go.”

“The House of Magus is still squabbling over who is to be the next High Magus,” Harm said.  “I doubt that you could get the required one hundred and one magicians to vote against her.  She is a graduate of Beneficence and a strong friend of the Lady Aylia.”

“She would still lose in the House of Commons, if I were to organise a party targeted against her,” Lord Randolph said, suddenly.  “And I am sure that you could deliver the Lords.  And then she would have to go, allowing us to place our own candidate on the Privy Council.”

“More than that,” Lucas’s father said.  “Those of us who had a coalition built and ready would be able to reshape the Privy Council at will, creating a much more functional design.  A few more…problems and the Lady Tiffany will be nothing more than a memory.”

“And then there are the Dark Sorcerers,” Harm said.  “Do we really want a political crisis with them on the rampage?”

“No better time to get rid of the person who isn’t very…effective against them,” Lucas’s father said.  He smiled at them all.  Lucas knew that he was already measuring their backs for the stiletto.  “Shall I order wine?”

The servants entered and poured the expensive wine into glasses.  Duke Rufus Valditch stood up and held out his glass, striking the formal toastmaster position.

“To the end of the Privy Council, and the new world order,” he said.  “To a world that belongs to those with the power and will to take it – and to do what must be done to keep it.”

They drank.

Chapter Twenty-One

The House of Lords looked rather unfriendly to Tiffany’s eye, even though everyone was being as obsequious as they had been before Merlin had left.  She kept her expression carefully composed as she walked through the long corridors and into the House of Lords itself, carefully avoiding glancing at either of the guards placed just outside the stone doors.  Camelot was taking on the look and feel of a city under siege, even though no one had seen anything of the Dark Sorcerers since five days ago, when they’d destroyed the Summer Palace.

She pursed her lips slightly as she walked down the centre of the aisle, towards the podium.  Someone had been pulling strings in the shadows, delaying her chance to address the combined Houses of Parliament.  She had her suspicions, but there was no way to prove who was behind it.  It had to be one of the Dukes, if only because only they would have had the levels of influence required to get away with it.  And yet...why did anyone benefit from delaying the response to the Dark Sorcerers?  No one would be foolish enough to use them as allies...

The thought didn't comfort her as she stopped on the podium and allowed the Speaker to call for silence.  The MPs quietened, but slowly, far slower than they would have when Merlin was alive.  The fact of his absence – and seemingly permanent departure – was sinking into their heads.  She was grimly aware that a dozen factions were starting to consider what they could do, now that Merlin was gone.  The very existence of the Empire was threatened by the Dark Sorcerers and they were wasting time playing politics.  How long would it be, she asked herself, before one of the fault lines Merlin’s power had kept in check exploded in her face?

“Members of the Houses of Parliament,” she said.  She spoke quietly, knowing that the magic woven through the building would ensure that everyone heard her words.  A pair of broadsheet writers, normally barred from the Houses of Parliament, could be seen scribbling down her words on notepads.  They’d have a special broadsheet issued afterwards, telling the public just what was going on in the Houses of Parliament.  “I have come before you to request a state of emergency.”

She paused, waiting for that to sink in.  The last time Merlin had declared a state of emergency, it had been back when Kentigern had been destroyed and later abandoned.  Merlin had needed to gather the resources of the Empire to help the remaining population evacuate, those who hadn't been confined to the Greenwood or killed by the demon.  The Houses of Parliament had bent over backwards to ensure that Merlin got what he wanted – but then, they’d had no illusions about the likely consequences if they refused.  Tiffany simply didn't have that sort of power.  The cold ring on her finger only underlined the absence of the immortal figure who’d held the Empire together by sheer force of will.

“The Dark Sorcerers have come into the open,” she continued.  It was a slight exaggeration.  After they’d ruined her wedding, a handful of other attacks – seemingly random – had been reported.  None of them had been on the same scale as the attack on the Summer Palace.  It was tempting to believe that the Dark Sorcerers were reluctant to bite off another large target, but Robin suspected that they were merely biding their time.  “They struck directly at the heart of the Empire.  Hundreds of people were killed, including two Dukes” – which should have alarmed the remaining eleven Dukes, even Duke Blackrock, wherever he was – “and seventeen MPs.  I believe that they intended to decapitate the Empire.”

They’d come alarmingly close to success, too.  If she’d been killed – along with the Privy Council and much of the higher-ranking MPs and aristocracy – nothing would have saved the Empire from fragmenting into chaos.  The Dark Sorcerers could have moved at will while the Empire came apart, breaking up into hundreds of independent states.  It was the nightmare that Merlin had always dreaded – an end to humanity’s unity meant the end of the Second Golden Age – and Tiffany had sworn to prevent it at all costs.  Did anyone ever recognise a golden age until it was over?

“The Dark Sorcerers are individually more powerful than our own sorcerers and magicians,” she said.  It was something that the House of Magus would normally have disputed, however irrationally, but the power struggle was only starting to tear their ranks apart.  The battle to nominate the next High Magus was far from concluded.  “They can teleport, crossing the entire world in a second – and they are the enemies of all.  I must request that we put aside our differences and unite to deal with the threat.  We must hunt them down and destroy them before it is too late.”

She paused, refusing to show any signs of weakness.  “By combining our forces, we can secure the likely targets and start an intensive search for their base,” she concluded.  “We will locate their base – and we will catch them and kill them before they can wreak havoc.  I must ask the Houses of Parliament to vote now.”

There was an immediate buzz of chatter.  The MPs didn't like being dictated to, even when Merlin had been alive and they’d had no choice, but to honour his representative.  Tiffany watched as the different power groupings made themselves clear; a handful of aristocrats there clearly in favour, a handful of commoners clearly unwilling to grant more power to the First Councillor.  It was hard to blame them; the commoners were already weakened by the Houses of Parliament and some of the reformers wanted more of a say in how tax monies were spent before they paid.  The Lords might control most of the lands, but the free cities were far more productive and paid most of the taxes.  In some ways, the Reform Party had a point.

Merlin would have allowed the Empire to slowly shift until it settled, with more day-to-day power in the hands of those who paid the bills.  Tiffany didn't have that option, not when the Lords didn't fear her like they’d feared Merlin and saw his departure as a chance to press their own agendas.  Pleasing both Houses of Parliament would be impossible, not when the Lords wanted to reclaim the powers they had lost and the Commons wanted to take most of their remaining powers.  Merlin could have dictated a solution; Tiffany didn't dare even to try.  It would tear the government apart.

The Speaker stepped forward and tapped his long staff against the floor.  Three great booms echoed through the chamber.  “Shall I call the vote?”

“No,” a voice said.  Tiffany looked up in surprise.  Duke Rufus Valditch, Duke of Effrul, had objected.  “I claim urgent business.”

“Duke Valditch claims urgent business,” another Duke said.  Tiffany forced her expression to remain calm, somehow.  How could anything be more urgent than the state of emergency, so they could confront and destroy the Dark Sorcerers?  “I move that we consider the urgent business first.”

There was a second buzz of chatter.  Some of the Lords were clearly surprised and moved to rebuke Duke Valditch and his allies.  The Commons were outraged and angrily demanded – pushing parliamentary order to the limits – that the Duke step back and allow the state of emergency to be debated.  There was no united response from the House of Magus, but Tiffany saw a number of magicians throwing their support to the Duke.  Some of them, she realised grimly, were clients of the various Dukes.  Others seemed inclined to get it over with so they could get back to the important business of choosing the next High Magus.

Tiffany scowled as the debate got out of hand, despite the Speakers pleas for quiet.  She’d never really appreciated the High Magus enough, definitely.  He’d had the force of personality – and power – to keep most of the House of Magus in line.  Now, without him, the magicians seemed on the verge of tearing away at each other in a desperate power struggle.  The Speaker seemed to have the same thought, but what could they do about it?  Two hundred of the most powerful magicians in the world were gathered in the Houses of Parliament.  If they started fighting each other, they’d take out the entire government.

The Speaker finally managed to get a quietened room.  “Duke Valditch,” he said, firmly.  “State your urgent business.”

Duke Valditch smiled, stroking his chin.  Tiffany caught sight of Lucas in his father’s box, looking worried.  He’d been at the wedding and had nearly been killed, along with hundreds of others.  The thought almost made her smile.  For a young man who’d tried to court her, and acted as if she should be so grateful for his attentions that she should open her legs at once, he was actually starting to grow up.

“On a point of order, My Lord Speaker,” the Duke said, “I believe that when a Duke wishes to address the assembled Houses of Parliament, he has priority over everything else?”

There was a long pause.  “That is true,” the Speaker said, finally.  It was one of the aristocratic rights, the right of precedence.  The House of Commons hated it, not without reason.  A nobleman who was determined to keep a particular bill from becoming law could just keep talking and talking until time ran out and the bill died in committee.  “However, these are volatile times...”

“And that is precisely why we must not abandon the right of precedence,” Duke Valditch said.  There was a murmur of approval from most of the House of Lords.  “In such unsettled times, we must cling to whatever order we can, knowing that it provides the stability that ensures that our Empire remains stable.”

He smiled around the chamber.  “However, it is not I who wishes to address the assembled Houses of Parliament,” he continued.  “It is one of the other Dukes, claiming the rights that he has been denied.  He has insisted that I present his representative to the chamber...”

A hooded figure, seated at the back of his box, stood up.  The hood was pulled so tight that it was impossible to make out a face – or perhaps there was a masking spell, concealing the face within the darkness – but Tiffany felt a sense of growing disaster.  A Duke wouldn't need such shenanigans to address Parliament, not when they controlled so much land and resources, unless...  The hooded figure drew back its hood, revealing a Husk.  Gasps ran through the chamber.

Tiffany fought to control her own emotions.  The only person who’d used Husks had been Merlin and, for a moment, she dared to hope that Merlin had returned at last.  But there was no sense of his presence, no power flowing through the ring...and anyone could create a Husk, if they knew the right spells.  The spells were on the edge of darkness, yet they weren't – quite – illegal.  Merlin had never forbidden them, for whatever reason of his own.

The Husk dropped the robe to the ground, revealing that it was dressed in the formal colours of Duke Blackrock.  Some members of the House of Commons got to their feet and started shouting abuse, others were staring, realising who was going to address them through the Husk.  Tiffany’s gaze swept along the ranks of the assembled noblemen, noting who seemed pleased, who seemed horrified...and who wasn’t surprised by the appearance of the Duke’s representative.  How many of them had known what to expect?

Her mind raced, rapidly.  Duke Blackrock had escaped from the Tower of Camelot, with a little help from a Dark Sorcerer.  And that meant...that he was in league with the Dark Sorcerers.  The thought made her blood run cold.  Tara wasn’t the largest duchy in the Empire – that honour belonged to the Duchy of Tchernobog – but any Duke commanded vast resources of land and money - and guardsmen.  And Duke Valditch had announced him...what was he playing at?  For a moment, she considered approaching Lucas, before remembering that his father rarely shared anything with him.  But then, no one in their right mind would have shared something sensitive with the old Lucas.

The Speaker seemed just as taken aback as the rest of the House.  “Duke Valditch,” he said, finally, “it has also long been established that a member of the Houses of Parliament must be physically present to address this august body.”

“That is true, yet it was waived on several occasions,” Duke Valditch agreed.  “Duchess Matzo, who was crippled by dark magic nearly a hundred years ago, was permitted to speak through a magical avatar by Merlin personally.  Lord Nottingham and Lord Calcutta were both permitted to send representatives to the House of Lords when they were on the front lines of the Serpent Wars.  Our esteemed First Councillor has declared a state of emergency.  Precedent states that in a state of emergency, members of the House of Lords can send a representative to the Houses of Parliament.”

Tiffany swore inwardly as another burst of chatter swept over the assembly.  The Speaker seemed stunned, unable to decide how to act.  Tiffany couldn't blame him, not really.  The Houses of Commons were governed by precedent as much as anything else – and Valditch was right, damn him.  Precedent would allow Duke Blackrock to address the Houses of Parliament from the safety of Tara.  She cursed her own hesitation under her breath.  If she’d had the nerve to execute him herself, long before Merlin had departed, this crises would never have arisen.  But who would have anticipated that Merlin would leave the world and abandon his Empire?  He hadn't mentioned it to his most trusted councillors.

“You are correct,” the Speaker conceded, finally.  There was a howl of outrage from the House of Commons.  They knew – everyone knew – why Duke Blackrock had been in the Tower of Camelot.  The thought of allowing a child rapist to address the Houses of Parliament was outrageous.  A number of the aristocrats looked uncomfortable as well, but Tiffany could see which way they would jump.  They would allow the Duke to address the Houses of Parliament, if only to support their own aristocratic rights.  “The Duke may address the Houses of Parliament.”

It took nearly seven minutes for the chamber to quieten down.  Several of the independent MPs – and even some of the magicians – were howling abuse at the Husk.  Tiffany concealed her facade of despair behind a wry smile, knowing that most of the magicians weren't so much outraged by the Duke’s crimes as perplexed – what had he gotten out of them, apart from satisfying his perversion?  A Dark Sorcerer might sacrifice children to the Darkness to gain power, but he wouldn’t actually rape them.

“Members of the Houses of Parliament, thank you for listening to me,” Duke Blackrock’s Husk said.  It had a dull raspy voice, rather than the aristocratic voice Duke Blackrock had possessed, before he'd been thrown into the Tower of Camelot.  “I would have addressed you in person, but a well-founded fear of persecution convinced me that sending a representative would be far safer.  The First Councillor, who seeks to rule in Merlin’s place now that the great tyrant is gone, wants me dead.”

There was another outburst of angry remarks from the House of Commons.  This time, the Speaker moved his hand in a complicated gesture and the spells tightened, muffling out their voices.  The Husk seemed more amused than anything else by the commotion, although there was no way of knowing just how tightly it was bound to its master.  Tiffany found herself wondering if she should destroy the Husk, hoping that the feedback through the psychic link would kill the Duke.  There was no way to know – and besides, the Husk had parliamentary immunity.  If she broke that, the Houses of Parliament would turn on her.  It was outrageous – and yet, what could she do?

“I have done nothing that was not done by others, over the years,” the Husk continued.  “And yet, I am the one tried by the First Councillor and thrown into the Tower of Camelot – without a chance to plead my case before the Houses of Parliament, or even Merlin himself.  The Lady Tiffany wanted me dead.  It was only through sheer luck that I was able to escape and make my way back to Tara.”

“Help from the Dark Sorcerers,” Tiffany snapped, aloud.  Her words would be heard by everyone.  They’d all know how the Duke had escaped, even though it would further dent the reputation of the Tower of Camelot.  It hardly mattered; even a team of dedicated magicians had been unable to re-establish the link to the interior of the tower.  They’d need to built a whole new prison, one that couldn't be anything like as secure as the Tower of Camelot.  “They broke you free.”

“Yes, they did,” the Husk agreed.  It turned, until its dead face was staring at Tiffany.  “The Dark Sorcerers only want to explore the limits of power, but for that they are hunted down by Merlin’s lapdogs.  Why, now that Merlin is dead, should we tolerate his rule?”

Tiffany stared.  The words were – almost literally – blasphemy, something that had occurred to the remainder of the Houses of Parliament.  MPs – Lords, Commons and even Magus – were on the feet, shouting angry demands for the Husk to be removed by force and destroyed.  Even the ones who had clearly supported the Duke’s right to speak were horrified.  She looked up at Duke Valditch and frowned.  The Duke’s face was expressionless.  Had he known what he was going to unleash?

“I am forced to take the most drastic action to preserve myself and my lands from the power-hungry bitch who aims to rule in Merlin’s place,” the Husk said, effortlessly outshouting the remainder of the chamber.  “In the name of my family, I declare independence from the Pendragon Empire.  Tara will become an independent state, where the laws and strictures that Merlin signed into law will no longer apply.  I invite you all to join me in preserving our rights against a ruthless woman who wants power...”

The chamber collapsed into chaos.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“I cannot believe his nerve!”

Robin looked up sharply as Tiffany stormed into their apartment within the Keep  He hadn’t been at the Houses of Parliament, but bad news had a habit of spreading quickly.  Duke Blackrock’s declaration of independence had been passed through the Knights of the Round Table, none of whom expected Parliament to let Tara go without a fight.  And even if they had been so inclined, Duke Blackrock’s announcement of a de facto alliance with the Dark Sorcerers who had freed him would have put a stop to that.  Dark sorcery was the one thing that might unite Lords and Commons in opposition.

“He’s insane,” Tiffany snapped.  She twisted away as he reached for her and sat down hard on a chair.  “Does he really think that we’d let him get away with it?”

“He may not be thinking at all,” Robin pointed out.  “How does declaring both independence and an alliance with the Dark Sorcerers help him?”

Tiffany glared at him.  “I cannot believe that you’re taking his side,” she said, sharply.  “Do you not know what that complete...sinner of a bastard man did?”

“Of course I know,” Robin said.  He hadn't been part of the party that had arrested the Duke, but word had spread rapidly even before Tiffany had made a formal announcement.  Duke Blackrock had kidnapped, raped and murdered a number of small children, merely to indulge his perverted lusts and passions.  It had shocked even the hard-boiled House of Lords.  Used to indulging their right to lust, intrigue and skirmish as they saw fit, even they had limits.  “And yet, why has he told the world he’s in alliance with the Dark Sorcerers?”

Tiffany contemplated it thoughtfully.  “Good point,” she conceded, reluctantly.  It had been the act of an insane man.  Why tell the world something that would ensure that he wouldn't be allowed to go free?  “Are you suggesting that he’s no longer in control of himself?”

Robin nodded.  It was easy to use magic – even without touching dark sorcery – to control a person’s mind.  The aristocracy warded themselves thoroughly against spells that could take control of them – with or without their knowledge – but Duke Blackrock had been stripped of all his wards before he'd been placed in the Tower of Camelot.  He would have been vulnerable to any kind of control spell – and some of them were powerful enough to rewrite his personality, turning him into a slave for the Dark Sorcerers.  If the Duke was now their slave, he would be doing their bidding – and all of Tara would follow him.  He was their Duke, their sworn liege lord...and Merlin was no longer present to intimidate any of his followers into changing their allegiance.

“Right,” Tiffany said, sardonically.  “It doesn't matter, anyway.  We can't get Tara leave the Empire, even if its Duke isn't in control of himself.”

“Maybe,” Robin said, reluctantly.  There was something about the whole scenario that didn't quite make sense.  If Duke Blackrock hadn't confessed to working with the Dark Sorcerers, there were enough aristocrats who might support him to prevent the Privy Council from moving against Tara.  And that would have ensured that the Dark Sorcerers had a base that would provide protection against detection.  They might have reasoned that Duke Blackrock’s liberation would draw a red line between Tara and the Dark Sorcerers anyway...or they might be up to something else.  But what?  No matter how he looked at it, he couldn't escape the sense that the Dark Sorcerers had thrown away a considerable advantage – and he couldn’t convince himself that it had been caused by their near-insanity.

“I have a meeting with the Privy Council in one hour,” Tiffany said, finally.  Cold determination was written all over her face.  “Duke Blackrock won’t be allowed to get away with this.  We’ll mass our forces and invade Tara within the week.  Even if he escapes, he won't be able to help his masters any further.”

Robin frowned.  The last serious war the Empire had fought had been the Serpent Wars, three hundred years ago.  The Garrison had never had to fight a serious battle since then; even the handful of peasant uprisings or various Dark Sorcerers hadn't required a full mobilisation.  Even with the advantages Merlin had given his personal army, he doubted that they could launch an invasion of Tara within the week.  Tara was an island and if the Duke’s own forces moved quickly, they could secure the free cities and the Garrison’s outposts before reinforcements arrived.

“The sooner we deal with this problem, the better,” Tiffany said.  She stood up and paced over to the window, staring out over the glittering towers of Camelot.  Robin watched her, feeling his heart swelling with love.  “The longer we leave the Duke alone, the more chance that someone else will try to follow him into declaring independence.”

Robin stood up and walked over to her, placing an arm around her waist.  She snuggled up to him gratefully, although he could read the tension in her body.  A moment later, she turned her face and kissed him gently on the lips.  Robin almost smiled, recognising the signs.  One thing they had in common was that they would both place their duty first.  As tempting as it was to spend the next hour in bed, they couldn't indulge themselves.  Duty was a hard taskmaster.

“I love you,” he whispered, kissing her red hair.

“I love you too,” Tiffany said.  It didn't seem fair that they hadn't even had the chance to take a proper honeymoon, but they’d agreed to wait until the Empire stabilised.  “I...”

She kissed him again and, for a while, the horrors of war seemed to recede.

***
The Privy Council assembled without fanfare or formality.  There were formal ceremonies for the opening of the council, but Tiffany had pushed them aside after Merlin had departed, knowing that they didn't have time to waste.  The High Magus’s seat was still empty – the reports she’d had from the House of Magus said that they were no closer to finding a successor, even though nine magicians had been turned into small hopping things and three more had been killed – and one of the others had been injured in the attack on the Summer Palace, but the others were present.  None of them looked particularly happy.

“Duke Blackrock must be stopped,” Tiffany said, once the room had been sealed.  She’d asked Robin – and Excalibur – to sit in, but she had carefully refrained from inviting anyone else.  The broadsheet writers had asked if they could have a place in the chamber; Tiffany had refused the request with an unholy amount of glee.  By now, the broadsheets would be telling the entire Empire that Duke Blackrock had declared independence, in the name of dark sorcery.  “We cannot permit Tara to become independent, let alone serve as a base for the Dark Sorcerers.  There’s no way that we can talk sense into him; we need to remove him by force.”

There was a long pause.  “The Houses of Parliament have granted us all necessary authority to deal with the rogue Duke,” she continued.  That was only technically true; the Houses of Parliament had voted her the authority, but they’d done it in a thoroughly limp-wristed way that suggested that some of them were waiting to see which side proved stronger before they jumped.  “However, we need to move fast.  In Merlin’s time, an attempt to declare independence would have been fatal; now, if we fail here, we will encourage nationalists of all stripes to launch their own declarations of independence.”

She nodded to Major General Sir Valiant, who unfurled a map on the table.  Once, they would have had a magical representation of the entire world in front of them, but that had been powered by Merlin’s will.  Now, the combined power of the combat magicians assigned to the Garrison hadn't been able to repower the crystal display.  Some of them believed that the spells could be simplified and rewritten to operate with less power, but Tiffany wasn’t holding out much hope.

“The Island of Tara,” he said, by way of introduction.  “The communications magicians have been busy.  There are three free cities in Tara and all three of them have come under siege.  Duke Blackrock’s personal guard has moved from their patrol bases and taken up positions outside the cities, cutting all lines of access.  So far, they haven’t tried to take the cities, but if they remain where they are for more than a few months, the cities will starve.”

Tiffany nodded, grimly.  The free cities might control most of the factories and the other means of production, but the aristocracy controlled most of the farmland and supplied food to the free cities.  They’d used the food weapon before from time to time, when too many peasants had fled their nobles and gone to the free cities, yet Merlin and the Privy Council had always been able to keep a lid on the crisis.  Now...the thought of the Dukes using the food weapon without restraint shook her to the bone.  The free cities would hardly let that pass without brutal resistance.

“We have one base on the island; the Garrison of Béal Feirste, near the free city of Béal Feirste,” the Major General said.  “So far, it hasn't been attacked, but there’s only one maniple assigned to the base so I’d be surprised if the Duke left it alone much longer.  I believe that our best course of action lies in summoning the free city guardsmen to the banner, reinforcing the Garrison with forces from England and then launching a direct strike against the Duke’s residence.  If we can capture him and his family, the remainder of Tara should surrender.  The Duke has never made himself very popular.”

He frowned.  “Our weakness is that we don’t have that many reinforcements on hand,” he continued.  “We can spare a couple of maniples from England, maybe four more from overseas, but that won’t give us parity with the Duke’s men.  If the Duke has assistance from the Dark Sorcerers, we may find ourselves out-powered as well as outnumbered.”

Tiffany frowned.  “Are you saying that we can't win?”

“I’m saying that it will be hard to defeat him without making a much larger commitment,” the Major General said, flatly.  “Merlin never allowed the Garrison to grow to a strength that matched its obligations.  We need to build up a much larger force without compromising its quality and that will take time.  It takes nine months to produce a Garrison soldier from scratch; much longer to produce a combat magician.  Our only real hope for rapid expansion of our forces comes from summoning the noble forces and civil guardsmen to the banner, but that will pose political problems.”

Robin leaned forward.  “What about a small team?”  He asked.  “We go in, break into his castle and assassinate the Duke.  His Heir might not be so inclined to risk all-out war with us.”

“It’s a possibility,” the Major General conceded, “but Tara might well fall into chaos.  The Dark Sorcerers would thrive in chaos.”

“Besides, there would be political issues,” Tiffany added, reluctantly.  A neat little assassination would have solved many problems, but it would have created others.  No matter how much they despised him, the House of Lords would be...unhappy about creating such a precedent.  Part of her was starting to wonder if the Houses of Parliament had voted her the authority to stop the Duke in the hopes that the Privy Council’s forces were scattered, or weakened by the conflict.  They’d hardly authorise new recruitment, or conscription.

“There’s also the issue of cost,” Lord Chancellor Rupert said.  “The cost of maintaining the Garrison isn't cheap; fighting a war, even a very short war, would be immensely expensive.  We are due to start collecting taxes and tithes within the next four months, but...”

He allowed his voice to trail off.  They all understood.  Merlin could command that taxes be paid and they would be paid, but the Privy Council didn't have that power.  The Houses of Parliament would hardly vote them money without demanding a say in how it was spent.  It seemed absurd to think that an empire that dominated an entire world could be poor, but Merlin had never collected taxes himself.  The Privy Council would be dependent upon the Houses of Parliament to fund the empire.  And they who paid the piper called the tune.

“Cost isn't an issue,” Baron Blackley snapped.  “This...man has been abusing children for years; now he thinks he can declare independence and build himself a world where he can keep abusing and murdering children for the rest of his life.  We need to bring him to justice or no one will have any faith in our government!”

“If we can't pay for the war,” the Lord Chancellor said, “the Duke may win by default.”

Tiffany tapped the table and they fell silent.  “We have enough time to make a start at removing him and his...dreams of independence,” she said.  “Major General – start moving forces to Béal Feirste.  Everything we can spare; men, magicians, combat dragons...I’ll even authorise the use of the few remaining Objects of Power.  I’ll speak to the Sorcerer Black; he may have little official standing in the House of Magus, but perhaps he can convince them to choose a new High Magus, or at the very least send additional magicians to Tara.

“Once we’re ready to move, we’ll move.  We’ll try to keep damage down to an absolute minimum, but whatever happens, the Duke is not going to walk away from this with his freedom, let alone an independent state.  Is that clearly understood?”

There were nods from around the table.  “Good,” Tiffany said.  “I’ll speak to people from the House of Commons; perhaps they can spare guardsmen to reinforce the Garrison’s forces.  If not, we may need to start recruiting again, quickly.”

On that note, the meeting ended.

***
Robin held Excalibur in one hand, feeling the energy shimmering within the sword.  It always surprised new recruits when they discovered just how heavy swords actually were, but Excalibur seemed to be light in his hands, as if it were made of air.  The brilliant white glow illuminating the chamber seemed to pulse steadily, endlessly.  Merely holding the sword gave him a burst of confidence that nothing else could match.  A single man holding Excalibur could destroy an entire army.

He returned the sword to its scabbard as Tiffany stormed into the room.  She looked...angry, and frustrated.  Robin watched her as she poured herself a drink and swallowed it hard, not without some concern.  Tiffany had never drunk more than a glass of wine in all the time he'd known her, even on their delayed wedding night.  To see her drinking now was worrying.

“No one wants to spare forces from their own petty concerns,” she said, as she put down the glass.  Robin winced.  That was worrying, if not surprising.  The aristocracy would see their personal forces as their only protection in a time of chaos, while the free cities would be reluctant to release their own guardsmen while the aristocracy had their own forces mobilised.  Besides, the Garrison could send its forces where it willed, but the free cities had limits.  Sending troops halfway around the world might prove...unpopular with the voters.  “What happened if we can't defeat the Duke?”

Robin took her in his arms, trying to comfort her.  The answer was simple enough; absolute chaos.  Without a strong central government, the Empire’s factions would tear it apart.  And then the Dark Sorcerers would claim control of the remains and doom the entire world to an endless nightmare of blood and suffering – if the Elves or Faerie didn't destroy the world first.

“I need you to go on a diplomatic mission,” Tiffany said.  Her body felt rigid in his arms, as if she was too stressed to think straight.  “Londinium has enough guardsmen to make a difference, even if they only send half of their forces to Tara. They won’t listen to me, but they might listen to you.  You’re a commoner – and you carry Excalibur.  If you could talk them into taking a hand in events...”

Robin frowned.  “But won’t that upset the House of Lords?”

“I'm sure it will,” Tiffany said, grimly.  “But on the other hand...if we don’t act now, we lose the entire Empire.  We have to stop this before it gets any further out of hand.”

She let go of him and stalked over to the table.  “We’re already moving as much as we can to Tara, but we need more,” she added.  “You have to convince them to spare some of their guardsmen, or we may well fail in Tara.”

Robin nodded, considering.  Duke Blackrock had indulged his tastes on commoners, not children of noble blood.  It had made him extremely unpopular in the House of Commons, who were often elected by people who’d fled the aristocracy.  That alone should encourage the Commons to assist with the war, but they’d be watching their backs carefully, untrusting of the other noblemen.  And yet...Excalibur might be enough to convince them to spare at least a few thousand guardsmen.  And if Londinium made that gesture, the other free cities wouldn't want to be left behind.  Hell, he was surprised that they weren't already fuming over the threat to their brother cities in Tara.

“I’ll go,” he promised.  In the scabbard, Excalibur seemed to hum at the prospect of action.  “You take care of yourself here, all right?  Watch your back.”

Tiffany smiled up at him, even though she looked tired and worn.  “I will,” she said, “and you watch yours.  The House of Lords is still uneasy over you carrying that sword.”

“But if I was the King of England,” Robin said, with a snort, “don't you think I’d be on the throne by now?  I don’t want to rule.”

“I believe you,” Tiffany said, “but do you really expect the aristocracy to believe it?”

Chapter Twenty-Three

It seemed to be a law of nature that wherever there were soldiers, there were camp followers.  Even the Garrison, Merlin’s personal army, had camp followers surrounding its bases, although it hadn’t gone on campaign since the Serpent Wars, three hundred years ago.  There were hawkers and traders, soldier’s wives and – inevitably – prostitutes, selling themselves to the soldiers in exchange for a handful of bronze pieces.  The practice was officially forbidden by the Church – which had been moralising for years on the subject – but no amount of preaching had ever put a stop to the practice.

Concealed behind a glamour that suggested she was nothing more than the wife of a common soldier, Faye watched from a distance as the Faerie Mound split open, disgorging a line of soldiers walking up to the base.  The Faerie Roads ran through Avalon and could be used, with the proper pacts, to move soldiers all over the world very quickly, without needing to worry about shipping or even logistics.  It had taken the maniple only an hour’s hard marching to cover the distance between Oceania and Tara, although it was clear that some of the soldiers had not enjoyed the experience.  The Faerie Roads could be disconcerting to those who possessed no magical talent of their own.

Her lips curved back in a humourless smile as a flight of dragons roared overhead, swooping down towards the dragon pens that were rapidly being expanded by workers from Béal Feirste.  The free city was on the verge of panic, with a strong force of guardsmen loyal to Duke Blackrock enveloping the city at a safe distance, even though the guardsmen had shown no sign of warning to storm and sack the city.  They’d been delighted when the first reinforcements started to arrive and their MPs had been loudly demanding action, hoping that the Privy Council would see fit to dispose the Duke’s family completely and hand his lands over to the free cities.  It wouldn't even be a bad solution either, Faye acknowledged, if they ever had the chance to put it into practice.  The Duke’s forces were chosen more for loyalty than competence – and they had no dragons.  Their best chance to win the war had been in the first few days, when they could have secured the Faerie Mound and then overrun the free cities.  Now…they were helpless observers as the Privy Council mustered its troops.

Faye stepped down, starting a long walk that would take her around the Faerie Mound.  Even from a distance, she could sense the wild magic tangling the air around the Mound, reminding her that there were some powers in the world far greater than the Dark Sorcerers.  And then it struck her…how long would the Faerie Roads remain stable?  No one knew who’d built them, but all the sources agreed that they were far older than Merlin, anchored and guarded by Beings of Power far superior even to the man who should have been the Antichrist.  How long would the pacts Merlin had struck with the Faerie Road’s masters remain in force, now that he was gone?

A handful of soldiers waved to her as she walked back, her glamour ensuring that they took her for granted, without questioning her presence.  She sensed the position of a combat magician and altered her path to avoid him, knowing that if he sensed her she would have to flee.  Silently, she counted the soldiers as the maniple took up positions, with sergeants bellowing orders and chivvying the soldiers into action.  Men were already digging latrines and organising watch parties.  It wouldn't be long before the Garrison was ready for its first serious war in three centuries.

Ambling aimlessly towards Béal Feirste, she waited until she was out of sight and well away from any detection wards cast around the camp, and then teleported back home.  Maledict would be very interested to discover that the plan had – so far – worked perfectly.  

The trap was about to be sprung.

***
“Old blood, old blood!”

Robin recoiled in surprise and horror as the old crone grabbed his leg, almost pulling him off the horse.  The beast whinnied in surprise as the lady seemed reluctant to let go.  Robin almost reached for his sword, before realising that there was no real threat.  The old lady seemed harmless, if crazy.

“Old blood,” she repeated.  She met his eyes with startlingly bright blue eyes, undiminished by the age crippling the rest of her body.  Her grey hair covered a scarred face, a legacy of a life on the streets.  Robin suspected, from her stare, that she had a vague precognitive talent, a talent that Merlin had alternatively tried to ignore or suppress.  True Oracles were rare, but whenever they appeared, trouble followed in their wake.  That had been enough reason for Merlin to outlaw their talents, or consign them to the Tribunal.  “You have old blood.”

Robin slipped off the horse and took her hand in his.  “Old blood?”  He repeated, perplexed.  “What do you mean…?”

“You can’t avoid the sins of the past,” the old woman said, earnestly.  “All you can do is learn from them. Your father’s father and his great-grandfather would have understood, but you’re their son and you have to learn for yourself…”

“Don’t worry about her, sir,” the guardsman escorting him said.  “Old Tilly is a harmless old baggage, wandering the city offering to tell people their futures in exchange for gold and silver coins.”

Robin looked up at him sharply, and then back to the old woman.  She was gone.  He recoiled in shock and reached for his sword, feeling Excalibur’s presence flowing into his very soul.  It was reassuring, a sense that there was no true danger, yet he couldn’t avoid the shiver running down the back of his spine.  He’d seen too many fortune-tellers in his hometown, but to see them in Londinium was unusual.  Or maybe not so unusual.  The free cities were often home to those who had no place on noble lands, or were persecuted by the Church.  And someone who had been brought up like that would have plenty of experience in disappearing without a trace.  It didn’t have to be magic…

“I’m glad to hear it,” he said, dryly.  He clambered back onto the horse and pressed his hands against the beast’s neck, feeling its racing heartbeat.  Animals were often more sensitive to the supernatural than humans and the horse felt as if it had had a nasty fright.  It was well-trained, too well-trained to bolt at the first sign of danger, yet Robin could tell how close the horse had come to breaking the conditioning, and the loyalty spells woven into its harness.  “Shall we resume our ride?”

It had been a hard journey from Camelot to Londinium, even though he’d ridden on the railway rather than galloping all the way from one city to the other.  Over a short distance, the railways didn’t have too much of an advantage over a man on horseback, but over a longer distance they effortlessly outpaced the horse.  And a railway could carry far more goods than any horse, although they were only able to run where engineers had laid down tracks.  Robin suspected that the transformation effected by the railways had only just begun – and the aristocracy suspected it too.  Why else would most of the senior noblemen have chosen to ban the railways from their territory?

The city of Londinium was larger than Camelot – and ugly.  Where Camelot affected a fairy-tale air, with soaring towers and magically-supported buildings, Londinium was composed of lower buildings and dirty factories.  A few dozen stone buildings in the centre of the city, straddling the great river Thames, looked clean, but much of the rest of the city appeared poor.  And yet…the city bustled with life in a way that no lordly-owned city ever could, for the people living within the free city were free.  They owed no aristocrat the fruit of their labour; they could work for themselves or work for others, and change jobs as they chose.  In the free cities, they could even read and indulge themselves in ways forbidden to those of their low-born station.  

Robin scowled as the wind changed and he smelled the smog drifting down from the factories.  In some ways, the free cities were less welcoming than the aristocratic lands.  Merlin had created the aristocracy and charged them with looking after their peasants, although many of them only paid lip service to the rules, but most of the governors of the free city felt no such obligation.  A peasant who arrived in Londinium might be lucky enough to find a career that would allow him to build a life for himself, or he might fall into one of the many pitfalls awaiting the unwary or the naive.  He might fall into debt and end up owing everything to a loan shark who would take everything and then leave him for dead, or he might be entrapped into working for low pay in a dirty factory, bound by contract never to leave or seek a change in his working conditions.  There were some of the lowly-born who were just as poor masters as the aristocratic lords; indeed, some of them were worse.  And with their wealth, often created by fair means or foul, how long would it be before they managed to gain titles and sit in the House of Lords?

The thought worried him as he was escorted over the bridge and up towards the Town Hall.  It was a massive building, as suited the largest of the free cities, almost a palace in its own right.  The study nature of the building belayed its true nature; a castle, without ever crossing the line that would have marked it out as an encroachment on aristocratic rights.  He hoped that the city fathers had paid the designer handsomely; without magic or artillery, assaulting the Town Hall would be expensive in lives and gold.

By law, the free cities weren't allowed to recruit their own private armies.  They’d circumvented the law by raising city guardsmen, who were technically a police force, but had training in military weapons and tactics.  A surprising amount of retired soldiers from the Garrison – and deserters from the various lordly armies – had also made their home in the free cities, offering their masters a military option that didn’t – quite – break the law.  Londinium produced most of the weapons for England, as well as several other parts of the Empire; it would be easy to produce an army at short notice.  The great advantage of firearms was that, unlike swords or magic, it didn’t take years of training to produce a soldier.

The Town Hall was heavily guarded, he noted as they rode up, but that didn’t stop the crowd of demonstrators outside from shouting their demands over the walls and into the ears of the city fathers.  Robin found himself struggling to understand what they actually wanted, before giving up in wry amusement.  No aristocrat would have tolerated such a rabble on his doorstep for a moment, but the city fathers of Londinium knew that they couldn’t afford to alienate large sections of the population.  In the aristocratic lands, the men who composed the lordly armies were often rejected and despised by their families, but in Londinium a city guardsman was a very honourable career.  Ordering the guards to charge might have them turning their guns on the city fathers instead – and then, there was the prospect of losing their seats at the next election.

He slipped off the horse as they reached the yard and spent a few moments stroking the beast, trying to calm him down.  The horse still looked spooked and Robin passed him over to a stable boy with some reluctance.  Even the highest of noble lords took care of his horse personally; it had been drummed into him from the very first day at the Garrison.  And instead, he was placing the horse into someone else’s hands, again.

The guards at the main doors balked until they saw Excalibur, and then they couldn’t get out of the way fast enough.  Robin concealed a smile and allowed the building’s castellan – a surprisingly young woman with dark skin and darker hair – to escort him through luxurious wooden corridors and into a reception room.  The castellan bowed and introduced him to Thomas Cromwell, the Lord Mayor of Londinium.

“Welcome to Londinium,” Cromwell said.  Robin shook hands with him, studying his face thoughtfully.  He’d expected to face the entire city council, not just the Lord Mayor, who was also the leader of the Reform Party.  Reform was strong in the older free cities, even though many of the wealthier factory owners campaigned against it.  Having arrived, they wouldn't want anything to upset the apple cart.  “We need to talk.”

Robin nodded, slowly.  He preferred fighting, not…verbal fencing.  Tiffany seemed to be good at it, even if she didn’t enjoy it, but Robin liked his fighting to be out in the open, not hidden agendas and secret motives.  The chair was sinfully comfortable, even against his armour.  The glow from the sword seemed amused at Robin’s dilemma.

“Certainly,” he said, finally.  “I have a brief to put before the city fathers…”

“Your wife wishes to borrow some of our guardsmen,” Cromwell said, dryly.  Robin looked up in surprise.  “It wasn’t too hard to guess.  One doesn’t have to have agents in sensitive places to know that the Garrison is dangerously overstretched, even before the Dark Sorcerers attacked your wedding.”

A maid came in with a bottle of red wine and two glasses.  Robin wasn't fond of wine, even though he knew that Tiffany loved the stuff, but he accepted it gratefully, recognising the hidden message.  The commoners were reputed to drink beer and nothing, but beer – serving wine was a subtle warning that he wasn't dealing with someone who would bow and scrape before him.

“That may be arranged, once the city fathers have had a chance to debate the issue,” Cromwell assured him, once the maid had departed.  “I will ensure that it is put before them, but I need to discuss a separate issue with you.”

Robin sipped his wine, waiting.  Cromwell’s support would ensure that the city supplied guardsmen to augment the Garrison – and he clearly had a price.  Absently, Robin wondered what it would be.  Support against one of the noblemen, political support in the Houses of Parliament, or even a relaxation of some of the rules governing the free cities?  There were just too many possibilities for him to guess a possible answer.

“The Empire is in a desperate situation,” Cromwell said, sipping his own wine.  “Even before the Dark Sorcerers, even before Tara declared independence…we were heading for a fall.  Merlin was the glue that held us together and without him, the different factions within the Empire started scrabbling for position.  The Privy Council can only serve as a temporary measure at best.  It won’t be long before the taxing season comes around and we start demanding a price in exchange for paying the bills.”

“True,” Robin said, neutrally.  If Cromwell thought that he could pressure his wife into doing something she didn’t want to do, he didn’t know her very well.  “But if we all work together…”

“We won’t work together,” Cromwell insisted.  “When we had an unquestioned monarch, everyone could jostle for position in relative safety, without tearing the Empire apart.  Now…we risk destroying everything we built over the centuries.  This Empire needs an Emperor.”

Robin smiled.  “And I’m sure you have a candidate in mind?”

“We do,” Cromwell said.  “You.”

“No,” Robin said, flatly.  “I am no monarch.”

Cromwell shrugged.  “You carry the sword that anointed the last king of England,” he said, ticking points off on his fingers.  “You are of common-birth, yet you married into the nobility.  Your ability to fight in defence of the Empire’s population is well-known.  You’re not exactly a diplomat” – Robin snorted at that – “but you could learn.”

He paused.  “And you would have the support of the House of Commons,” he added.  “That would count for a lot in the first days of your rule.”

Robin didn’t pause to consider it.  “I don’t want to rule,” he said, firmly.

“That might make you the best person to rule,” Cromwell said.

“Enough games,” Robin snapped, suddenly angry.  “What do you want from declaring me Emperor of the Pendragon Empire?  What do you get from all this?”

“I get a stable Empire,” Cromwell said.  He smiled in a manner that Robin suspected was intended to be disarming.  “Even before Tara, there were rumours that the aristocrats were plotting to crush the free cities and restore unquestioned – and unquestionable – aristocratic rule on the Empire.  Now…Duke Blackrock has shown the way.  They may strike at any time.”

“I’m sure you’ve made preparations to counter the aristocrats,” Robin said, slowly.  Cromwell might well be right.  Tiffany had concealed nothing from him, even the depth of her worry at the reports of secret meetings and shadowy preparations.  If most of the noblemen turned on the Privy Council, its grip would be shattered.  “But why me?”

“The Empire needs a ruler, an unquestioned dictator who can keep matters in line,” Cromwell said.  “War isn’t good for business and a civil war fought between aristocrats and free citizens – and the Dark Sorcerers as well – would be devastating.  And that doesn’t include any worries we might have about the Greenwood.  My magicians say that the boundary lines are slowly collapsing.  What happens when they fall?”

There was a knock on the door.  “Sir,” someone shouted, from outside.  “You’re needed in the tower, now!”

“The tower?”  Cromwell asked.  “What’s going on?”

“This city is under attack,” the voice said.  It sounded as if the speaker was starting to panic.  Robin came to his feet and followed as Cromwell raced towards the door.  An attack could only mean one thing – unless the noblemen had decided to speed up their own plans and start the civil war.  “We’re surrounded by monsters!”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Morag hated magicians.

It wasn’t that they had power and she – a lowly servant in the Magician’s Circle – had none.  She’d been born to a poor family and expected little better than servitude for the rest of her life.  It was that power made magicians arrogant and careless.  She’d been used as the butt of their jokes every time the magicians held a convocation, where they’d shown off their powers to one another by using them on the servants.  Morag had spent a week as a frog before a team of wizards had managed to undo the spell, been charmed into obedience more times than she could count and suffered a hundred minor humiliations at their hands.  Worst of all, there was no recourse; the magicians enjoyed a form of immunity from the Civil Guard that criminal masterminds would have envied.  No Civil Guardsman wanted the magicians mad at him.

And then she’d met the old man.  Her memory was hazy on exactly where and when they’d met, but she remembered his words clearly.  There was a way she could get back at the magicians who’d used her as their plaything.  All she had to do was take them some drinks, after carefully placing a fine white powder into the glasses.  Morag wasn't quite sure how she’d been talked into it, but the thought of humiliating a dozen magicians and wizards was too good to refuse.  They’d pay for what they’d done to her and the rest of their servants.

The Magician’s Circle was the centre of magical activity in Londinium.  In theory, the magicians were supposed to work together for the good of the city, but in practice the only good they did was maintaining the wards that protected the city against supernatural attacks.  The wards weren't perfect – which Morag blamed on the magicians having fun rather than doing their job – but they worked, after a fashion.  A Dark Sorcerer who wanted to slip through the wards would find it a difficult task.

She pushed the door open and stepped into the chamber, holding the tray of drinks in front of her.  A dozen magicians, each one capable of turning her into a frog with a snap of their fingers, were lounging on comfortable sofas, channelling their considerable powers towards the defence of their city.  Morag had acquired a certain minor sensitivity towards magic in the years of her servitude and she could feel it crackling around the men, leaving her wondering if she was really doing the right thing after all.  As a free citizen of Londinium, she enjoyed the right to be judged by a jury of her peers, but that would cut no ice with the magicians.  They could punish her in any way they saw fit – from permanent transfiguration to binding her as a slave – and no one would protest.  The voice of the old man echoed in her head and she pushed forward.  A little humiliation would be good for them.

Morag moved from figure to figure, handing out the glasses.  Powering the wards was evidently tiring work, although that didn’t stop a couple of the younger magicians from pinching her buttocks as she passed.  It only fired her determination to ensure that they all drank.  She watched as they started to sip at their drinks, praying that the old man had been right and the powder actually was tasteless.  The magicians were supposed to have personal wards that would keep out anything that was actively poisonous, but something designed to be humiliating would slip through the net.  Or so the old man had sworn.

And then it dawned on her that she couldn’t even remember his face…

The first magician, a young man whose dapper looks were enhanced with magic, clutched his throat and emitted a gargling cry for help.  Morag opened her mouth in horror as five other magicians quickly followed, one of them starting to thrash around until he fell off his sofa.  A sixth magician opened his mouth, perhaps to utter a curse or cry for help, but blue flames burst out of his mouth, just before his entire body went up in fire.  It was a very strange fire, part of Morag’s mind noted; it didn’t seem to touch the sofa, even though the heat sent her staggering backwards.

She stared as two more magicians stretched, seconds before their skin started to warp.  Bones forced their way out of their skin, sending blood flowing down towards the floor.  There was a terrifying cracking sound and the seventh magician seemed to explode as his bones shattered.  The eighth and ninth found themselves merging into one monstrous being, their joined mouth screaming out in silent agony before they lost even the appearance of humanity and became a fleshy mass on the floor.  She stumbled backwards as the tenth and eleventh caught fire and blazed into pillars of light.

The twelfth magician stumbled to his feet.  Blood was running down his nose and spewing out of his mouth, but he somehow managed to remain upright.  He lifted one weak finger and pointed it at Morag, his lips trying to form a spell.  She found herself frozen, unable to move, waiting to see what he would do to her.  He was trying to chant…and then a wave of blood seemed to burst out of his skin and he collapsed to the floor, nothing more than a pile of flesh and bone.  Morag found herself suddenly able to move again and she fled, running for her life with no destination in mind.  Raw panic left her with only one thought in her mind; Dear God in Heaven, what had she done?

***
Robin reached the tower a moment after the Lord Mayor and caught his breath as he peered out over Londinium.  The free city was surrounded by charmed walls, intended to deter any of the nobles from launching a swift raid to recover peasants who had fled their masters in the hope of finding a better life; outside the walls, an army of monsters had gathered, surrounding the city.  Some of them were little more than warped humans; others seemed to have forsaken even the humanoid form.

His eyesight seemed to have sharpened ever since he’d been given Excalibur.  It was easy to see the monsters, misshapen humans whose lives had been wreaked by wild magic.  They didn’t have the faint shimmer that marked Elves and other creatures from Avalon – the sense that the form the human eye saw was one that it could comprehend – which was something of a relief.  Robin had dreaded an attack from Avalon ever since Merlin had departed and the boundary lines had started to collapse.

The monsters were waiting, but waiting for what?  Robin rapidly skimmed through his memory of encounters between the Knights of the Round Table and monsters from the Greenwood.  Some had remembered enough of their humanity to want human desires – women, wealth, freedom – while others had been warped beyond recognition, to the point where they were little more than unthinking beasts.  But they’d never formed an army, or launched a raid outside the Greenwood in force; they’d known that Merlin’s magic and his armies would throw them back into the Greenwood.  And now Merlin was gone.

“The Civil Guard is mustering now,” a voice said.  Robin half-turned to see a messenger addressing Cromwell, informing the Lord Mayor of something he had to have already known.  The church bells had been ringing ever since the monsters had arrived, summoning the Guardsmen to duty and calling the rest of the city to pray.  Robin wondered, absently, just how prepared the city actually was.  In his experience, some Guardsmen were fully the equal of Garrison soldiers and others were only playing at war.  “They’re forming up in the square.”

Cromwell looked over at Robin.  “But what are they waiting for?”

Robin nodded, thoughtfully.  Assuming that there was more to this raid than a simple smash and grab – and moving such an army through the hidden pathways in the Greenwood would be tricky – the monsters had to be waiting for something.  But what?  By now, the communications magicians would be sending a desperate cry for help to Camelot.  Dragons would be on their way; what few troops could be spared would be rushed through the Faerie Roads to reinforce the city.  And it might even convince the House of Magus to unite and join the coming battle.  What were they waiting for?  Their best hope of victory had to be when the city had been surprised, unprepared to resist an immediate attack.

If the enemy looks as if he’s doing something stupid, his old master had warned, you’re missing something.  The enemy knows something you don’t.

“I don’t know,” he said, out loud.  The wind shifted suddenly, blowing the scent of the monsters – unwashed humans, unclean things, tingling with wild magic – into his face.  Carefully, he unsheathed Excalibur and held it up, taking refuge in the power pulsing around the brilliant sword.  He wondered suddenly if the monsters would see it and start to run.  “I don’t know what they’re thinking.”

Cromwell frowned.  He looked nervous, understandably so.  A human army wouldn't want to sack the city, not if it could be avoided; Londinium was worth far more intact, even to the nobles, than as a burned ruin and slaughtered population.  The monsters, on the other hand, would hardly be able to keep the city even if they did capture it.  They’d loot, rape and slaughter their way through the burning city, and then retreat before reinforcements arrived.

“Perhaps we should launch an attack ourselves,” he said, finally.  He stroked his beard as if it would calm his nerves.  “We could drive them away from the city…”

“Unlikely,” Robin said.  In his experience, fighting monsters from the Greenwood on their own terms was asking for trouble.  “When they try to storm the walls, we’ll have the position to inflict huge losses before they can break through the walls.”

He studied the city for a long moment.  “Get your Guardsmen working on evacuating the houses closest to the main gates and the wall,” he said, finally.  “They may have to be turned into strongpoints to hold the line.”

Cromwell stared at him.  “You’re not suggesting that the bastards will make it over the wall?”

Robin shrugged.  “I’d be surprised if they didn’t,” he said.  “They have a very large army and your men are inexperienced…”

A subtle flicker of magic ran through the air, a sense that something gossamer-thin had just shattered.  Robin swore as he drew on his Sight and peered out over the city.  The magic worked by the magicians in the magicians’ quarter was as strong as ever – hardly as strong as any of the Great Colleges – but the wards surrounding the city had collapsed.  They’d just flickered out of existence.

“Lord Mayor,” a messenger shouted.  He was holding a communications crystal in his hand, one created by an enchanter to pass messages from place to place.  “We just had word from the Magicians Circle!  The magicians who were holding the wards are dead!”

Cromwell’s face paled.  “If the wards are gone…”

“There’s nothing stopping any kind of supernatural vermin from making their way over the walls,” Robin said.  A low rumble echoed through the air, coming from the lines of monsters.  “I think they’re about to attack.”

Dark specks appeared in the sky, heading towards the city.  For a moment, Robin dared to hope that they were dragons from Camelot, but they were too small and bulky.  They looked like hawks and eagles, monstrous mutations caused by the wild magic of the Greenwood, ridden by humanoid creatures holding primitive weapons.  The swarm descended towards the city, shrieking their cries into the air.  The sound of gunfire broke out as Guardsmen tried to shoot down the giant birds, but for every one that fell two more were there to take its place.  They swooped down, dropping small bottles onto the city, and flames began to spring up wherever the bottles fell.  Some of the birds rose up again, men and women caught in their talons, only to drop them when they’d reached a suitable height.  None of their victims survived the fall.

“Get behind me,” Robin snapped.  Either through luck or judgement, perhaps aware that they were targeting the leaders of the city, a pair of birds were dropping down towards the small party on the tower.  He lashed out with Excalibur and sliced one of the birds in half, killing it and its rider with a flick of the wrist.  The second bird spat something towards him and only a warning from Excalibur caused him to lift his armoured hand to cover his face.  Green liquid splashed against his armour, acid powerful enough to melt through his flesh within seconds.  He jumped forward and sliced the bird’s head off.  The humanoid on its back tried to raise a primitive sword to block him, but Excalibur shattered his blade on contact.  Robin killed him and kicked the remains off the tower.

Cromwell’s face was very pale.  He could see flames rising up all over the city; hear the cawing of the birds as they tore through unsuspecting citizens.  Others were being shot out of the sky by the Guardsmen as they recovered from their surprise. Robin glanced at him once, noticed his trembling fingers struggling to grip his sword’s hilt, and quietly abandoned any hope of convincing the Mayor to fight.  He wasn’t a warrior.

“Get him down to the council chambers,” he ordered, grabbing a pair of servants.  Unlike their master, they’d come armed with knives and clubs.  If they’d had guns, or even swords…he pushed the thought aside, sharply.  There was no point in worrying over what might have been.  “I’m going to the front.”

Holding – and trusting – Excalibur, he took a flying leap off the tower and jumped right to the nearest rooftop.  His armour had to work hard to protect him from the impact, but there hadn’t been any other choice.  Another bird swooped down at him, only to change course as soon as it saw Excalibur.  The building under him was on fire, burning rapidly; Robin jumped to the next rooftop, and then the next, hoping that he could reach the walls before the main body of the attack made it over and into the city.  If the magicians who were supposed to have been maintaining the charmed walls – and the city’s wards – were dead, there would be no magical help for the defenders.  With so much chaos in their rear, it would be impossible to coordinate a defence.

Catching sight of another messenger picking his way through the streets, Robin leapt down towards him, relying on his armour to shield him from the spreading fires.  The messenger looked up and then cowered, as if he expected Robin to split his head open with Excalibur.  Instead, Robin shook him until the messenger looked faintly aware of his surroundings.  If there’d been time…

”Go to the Magician’s Circle,” he ordered.  All the magicians in the city should be members, but they’d be in the magicians’ quarter or dead by now.  Any survivors, he hoped, would be making their way to their guild house.  “Tell them to concentrate on rebuilding the walls first; they can work on the walls afterwards.”

Giving the messenger a shove, he turned and sprinted down towards the walls.  The baying of the monsters outside was growing louder as they struggled forwards, despite the gunfire and cannon fire from the walls.  Robin hoped that they’d wipe out entire parties of monsters, but the odds were against it.  The Greenwood produced many freak mutations and those that survived their first few weeks tended to be tough and hard to kill.  He'd met a monster once that had had to be burned alive to kill it…and even then, he had never been quite sure that the monster was dead.

He heard a shriek and turned to see a woman, knocked to the ground by one of the monsters who’d been dropped into the city by the birds.  Robin wasn't sure if he was trying to rape or murder the young woman, but it hardly mattered.  He ran forward, sword in hand, and sliced the monster in half.  It let out a disconcertingly human cry and collapsed on the ground.  The young woman, her shirt torn away exposing her breasts, looked up at him gratefully and then collapsed on the ground.  Robin pulled her into a corner where she should be safe and left her, praying to God that he was in time.  Ahead of him, the guardsmen on the walls suddenly fell back.  A brilliant green light appeared, shimmering over the walls, and then they collapsed.  Robin cursed as the guards fell back, and the monsters advanced.

Some were very human, the only signs of their true nature being warped faces and arms.  One appeared almost normal, until Robin saw the tentacles that had replaced his arms, rendering him almost helpless in human society.  The others were true monsters, shambling brutes that bore little relationship to humanity.  They seemed to be leading the charge, their wounds slowly healing when they hadn’t proved fatal.  One of them would pose a challenge even for a Knight of the Round Table – and thousands of them seemed to be coming right at him.

Robin caught at a handful of fleeing guardsmen and pulled them to him, holding Excalibur aloft like a glowing talisman.  The light from the sword seemed to give the monsters pause, just enough time for Robin to convince the guardsmen to form a line.  They couldn’t hold the monsters indefinitely, but if they held them up for a few minutes, there would be time to form a second line of defence.

“Come on, you bastards,” he yelled, as the monsters started their advance.  Their howls were deafeningly loud.  “Come and get us if you think you can!”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Londinium was burning.

The Sorcerer Maledict floated high over the flames, watching as the city was swiftly consumed by the fires.  Despite the best efforts of both magicians and mundane fire chains, the flames were rapidly spreading out of control, at least in the poorer parts of the city.  They’d had to build their houses out of wood or other flammable materials and the flames spread quickly, forcing the inhabitants to flee for their lives.  The richer parts of the city were built from stone or brick, often charmed to make it harder for the fire to spread, ensuring that parts of the city would remain intact.  The Duke would be pleased.

Maledict let his mouth fall open in a laugh, his high-pitched cackle echoing out over the city.  In the long run, who cared what the Duke thought?  He might have delusions about using Maledict and his Dark Sorcerers to firmly plant his ducal buttocks on the Iron Throne – once it was removed from the wreckage of the Iron Palace – but the delusions wouldn't last forever.  Once the Privy Council had been defeated, the Duke’s usefulness would come to an end.  And then Maledict would introduce him to the true power of dark sorcery.

His smile grew brighter as he sensed the strands of magic burning through the flames.  The magicians in the city were struggling to join the battle, trying to use their powers to put out the fires or knock the deadly birds out of the sky, but it was a losing battle.  They’d already lost their most powerful members and the city was burning down, destroying the enchanted focal points they’d created to protect the city.  They could probably sense his presence in the air, yet they hadn’t even tried to cancel the spells holding him aloft.  It was the ultimate expression of weakness.

The river seemed to be glowing with light, the shimmering glare of the fires reflected back at him.  He smiled as he sensed the pulses of magic making their way up the river, now that observers and river wardens were distracted by the monsters tearing their way through the main gate.  They’d be in for a nasty shock when the next prong of his attack finally surfaced.  He glanced down and caught sight of a small street urchin running from building to building, perhaps carrying messages for the defenders, or perhaps merely trying to save his young life.  Maledict pointed a long finger at him and spoke a deadly charm; the boy’s figure exploded into a mass of rats, which promptly scattered in different directions.  It would be impossible for any magician to gather them together to restore the boy’s human form, if any of them cared enough to try.

He soared higher, allowing the heat from the flames to buffet him upwards.  This was true power, he told himself; this was what Merlin had denied humanity all those long years he’d ruled the world.  They couldn’t stop him, even if they could find him – and the city was on the verge of destruction.  If – when – his forces left, they’d leave behind ruins and a shattered population.  The Duke would seize his chance to move in and establish his control, still convinced that the Dark Sorcerers were working for him.  And then he’d be in for a nasty shock…

Maledict laughed out loud.  Down below, some of the struggling population heard his laugh and shivered, even if they didn’t understand what it signified.  He knew that he was going insane, that the vast reserves of power he’d tapped into were burning through his body and soul, but he didn’t care.  He had the power to keep himself alive, even as his body broke down.  Indeed, perhaps even immortality was within his grasp.

A stream of bubbles broke the surface of the water and he smiled.  It wouldn't be long until the final phase of the attack began.

***
The stream of monsters didn’t bother with subtlety.  They just charged at the thin line of men Robin had assembled, relying on weight of numbers to overwhelm the defenders.  Robin clutched Excalibur tightly as they closed in, drawing comfort and power from the sword.  The mere presence of Excalibur seemed to hearten the defenders, even though the monsters had overcome their fear.  An entire army was bearing down on them.

“Fire,” Robin barked.  The men with firearms opened fire, blowing great chunks of flesh and bone out of the advancing horde.  It would have deterred any purely human enemy, but the Greenwood monsters just kept coming, crushing the bodies of their fallen comrades below their feet.  They were a horrendous mass of humanoid figures, each one warped in a different way, either through wild magic’s touch or through miscegenation.  There were entire communities in parts of the Greenwood; indeed, some savants believed that Goblins and Orcs had originally been human, before they’d been touched by wild magic.

He lifted Excalibur as the monsters closed into arms reach and swung.  Robin was strong, strong enough to drive a normal sword through their heads and slide into their brains, but Excalibur slid through flesh and bone like a knife through butter.  He saw a disturbingly human expression of vague surprise on the face of his target before he died, yet he had no time to sit and ponder the implications.  The dancing sword, moving almost of its own accord, was swinging from monster to monster, slicing through them and leaving their bodies bleeding out on the ground.  

The Guardsmen were fighting bravely, but they didn’t have a magical weapon.  Robin saw four of them fall when they make the mistake of assuming that they could slice through their bodies as easily as they could slice through an unarmed human.  The monsters seemed to absorb the blow and crash into them, their powerful hands ripping off arms and legs, leaving the helpless guardsmen to be crushed beneath their feet.  Other Guardsmen, the smarter ones, nipped in and out, slicing away at the monstrous legs.  Disabling the monsters seemed to be the only way to win.

Robin leapt forward, guided by the sword, and laid about him with the glowing blade.  A pile of dead monsters rapidly surrounded him, but they kept coming, unafraid to die as long as they took him down.  He could no longer tell where he ended and Excalibur began; the sword’s constant shimmering presence had merged into his mind, guiding his strikes with deadly efficiency.  And yet the monsters kept coming.

He was barely aware of a semi-humanoid beast three times the size of a man, lashing out towards him with a fist bigger than Robin’s body.  The sword pushed him into the air and he leapt towards the beast, landing right on its forehead.  He was gone again, his sword slashing down into the body and scattering blood and guts everywhere, before the giant could react.  It hadn’t been one of the two legendary giants who’d ruled Tara until Merlin turned them both into stone, yet it had been dangerous enough.  He jumped again as its body crumpled to the ground, crashing down with tremendous force.  Excalibur’s power seemed to flare into him and he simply took it in stride.  A detached part of his mind reacted with horror, realising for the first time how Arthur had been able to forge a Golden Age that had lasted until his bastard son reached his majority and came to Camelot, burning with determination to punish his father for fathering him and then leaving him to the tender mercies of his sorceress mother.

A crawling monster that might have been a man – or a centipede before the wild magic transfigured it into something new and deadly – lunged at him, long claws reaching out to spear him and hold him in place.  Robin lashed out and sliced through the tentacles, but new ones formed almost as soon as the old ones fell to the bloody ground.  He leapt forward and sliced the creature’s head off with one blow, only to watch in horror as the body kept marching forward.  The beast kept pushing him backwards, glowing strands flickering on its skin suggesting that leaping onto the monster would be fatal.  Robin backed away, discovering that most of the Guardsmen were dead or had retreated to another defence line.  He was the only person still holding the monsters back…

Cursing, he kept moving backwards, jumping in to slash at the beast and then back again before it could catch him.  Even Excalibur seemed to be balked by its regenerative capabilities.  No matter where he cut, or how much he cut off, the beast seemed to keep moving, an unstoppable force.  Indeed, he was starting to wonder if the parts he’d cut off were going to grow new bodies and create new monsters.  It had to be stopped before it got into the city.

Inspiration struck and he turned to run, right towards a burning hovel.  The centipede-monster emitted a noise that might have been a shriek of victory and gave chase, clearly believing that he had a Knight of the Round Table on the run.  Robin kept running – he could have outrun the brute, except it didn’t seem to be tiring – until he put his back to the fires and then – trusting to luck – he made a rude hex sign at the monster.  As he had hoped, the monster roared with anger and lunged forward heedlessly.  Robin jumped backwards, calling on all of the protections built into his armour to protect him from the flames; the centipede was less lucky.  The fire raged around it and, for the first time, it showed signs of pain.  Robin caught up pieces of burning wood with an armoured hand and threw them towards the creature, trapped within the blaze.  Its disturbingly human eyes stared at him with a look of infinitive malice, just before the fires roared up and incinerated it.  Robin waited just long enough to ensure that the creature was dead, and then turned and ran towards the next defence line.

He saw a shape at the corner of his eye and turned to look.  It was a statue of a guardsman, standing there with an expression of horror and despair on his face.  Puzzled, Robin stepped forward – and realised that it wasn't a statue at all.  Wild magic was flickering over the stone, suggesting that it had once been a guardsman.  A figure moved behind him and he saw a young girl, her face oddly shrouded by a hood.  She was young and shapely, yet she moved like a very old woman, with slow tentative steps.

Robin opened his mouth to ask her who she was, when she threw back her hood, revealing a serpentine face.  Green scales seemed to have merged into human skin, with no way of knowing where one ended and the other began.  Her face started to shift and transform into something inhuman – for a second, he saw writhing snakes – and everything clicked together in his mind.  He twisted away from her, breaking eye contact, as a burst of wild magic crackled over his armour.  She might have been human once, but now she was a gorgon.  Or maybe a gorgon and a human had mated and produced children.  Her face suggested elements of both races.

He squeezed his eyes shut as she emitted a second blast of wild magic.  Unlike the more controlled forms of magic Merlin had introduced and the Great Colleges taught, the wild magic needed eye contact to turn its victim into stone.  And yet, it was almost impossible to restore someone after they had been transfigured into stone by a gorgon.  This hybrid’s magic might be less dangerous, but Robin wasn't prepared to bet his life on it.  He’d never even heard of a gorgon-human hybrid before the battle had begun.

The girl’s voice was low, almost hypnotic.  It was laced with seductive magic that would worm its way through all defences, through all awareness that something wasn't right.  Robin clutched Excalibur tightly, thinking of Tiffany, as her voice tried to crack into his mind.  If he lowered his defences, she could twist his mind until he walked willingly into her magic, or said or thought or believed anything she wanted.

“Look at me,” she whispered.  It took all of Robin’s determination, enhanced by Excalibur’s glowing presence in his mind, to keep inching away from her.  His legs felt as if they had already been turned to stone.  “Look at me…”

“Right,” Robin said.  Even speaking was hard.  “If you insist…”

Desperately, he held up the sword, using it to reflect her image back at her.  There was a blinding flash of light and a long helpless cry before the magic faded away and was gone.  Carefully, he turned to look and saw that the girl-gorgon had become a stone statue of herself.  There was nothing left of humanity in her face now, just snake-heads oozing out of every pore.  He held up a fist, reinforced his armour, and struck the statue a terrible blow.  She shattered and fell to dust.

There were other monsters advancing now, pressing down towards the makeshift barricades the guardsmen had been assembling.  Robin leapt into the air again and soared towards a stone building that had remained intact, even in the fires.  He could hear people crying below, trapped in their house, but there was no time to do anything to help them.  The monsters were pressing in all around the burning buildings, advancing upwards towards the heart of the city.  Smoke and flames filled the sky.  The sound of the advancing army was deafening.  Their mutated birds cawed as they flew through the sky, swooping down to snatch up unwary victims and drop them from a great height.

Robin heard another feminine cry from the building under his feet and made up his mind.  Using Excalibur, he cut through the hatch that led down into the building.  He was greeted by more screams from female throats and a rock that clanged off his armour and fell onto the roof.  He shouted his name down the hole and held Excalibur forward, allowing the sword to identify him.  Finally, four women – one mother and three daughters, who were barely entering their teenage years – showed themselves.  Their faces showed no doubt about what awaited them if the invading army won the day.  Robin privately resolved to ensure that they were safe, whatever else happened.

“Come on,” he ordered, sharply.  Peasant women would have obeyed at once, but then obedience – to their fathers, brothers, husbands and local headman – was hammered into their heads from a very early age.  City women were more independent.  At least these four realised that they couldn’t stay any longer, not with monsters pressing against the walls, monsters that would eventually break down the door and storm the building.  “You have to get out of here.”

Straightening up, he looked up towards the heart of the city.  Like many other cities, Londinium had little bridges and pathways leading from roof to roof, used by messengers and – illegally – street children and criminal gangs.  It was the only hope of getting the women to what passed for safety in the city, but the fires had consumed most of the nearby bridges long before he’d heard their cries and come to help.  There was a safe path, yet it wouldn't stay safe for very long.

He helped the mother through the hatch and pointed the family towards the first bridge.  “Hurry,” he ordered.  “Keep your heads down and be careful!”

There was a chance that one of the giant birds would catch them, but there was nothing Robin could do about that.  The first of the girls looked reluctant to run along the bridge until her mother slapped her ass hard, at which point she started running as if a demon was after her.  If the Dark Sorcerers were involved in the attack, which seemed fairly likely, they might release demons as a parting shot before they departed.  They’d unleashed a demon before, at the Summer Palace.

Robin waited until the women were across the bridge before following them.  It creaked and shook under his footsteps; a moment later, after he reached the far end, it collapsed and smashed down onto monstrous heads.  Praying that the impact had killed a few of the monsters, Robin kept his unwilling charges running until they finally reached the barricades.  From above, it looked as if the guardsmen had dragged out everything from furniture to concrete supplies and started working them into a construction that might – just – cost the monsters a few hundred lives to break.  Robin waved at the women, ordering them to keep running, and then headed over towards the barricades.  A giant bird saw his armour and swooped down at him, talons extended and ready to seize him, but Robin sliced it out of the air and sent its body tumbling down to form part of the barricade.

He braced himself to jump down and join the defenders, but something caught his eye.  The river looked…odd.  It flowed through the city, past the Town Hall and the other government buildings – and another of the Great Colleges – before it wandered down to the sea.  Part of Londinium’s importance was that it was well-placed to profit from ships and shipbuilding, just like a hundred other free cities scattered around the world.  But now the river was…bubbling?

Robin saw it, but he didn’t believe it.  Giant shapes were moving under the water, bubbles marking their passage as they advanced towards the Town Hall.  Monstrous shapes, strange misshapen bulges, could be seen breaking the water – and then a giant claw broke the surface.  Robin felt a cold chill running down his back as the first of the giant crabs came into view, claws larger than a tall man reaching out to pick up fleeing humans and snapping them in two with casual power.  The boats that were being used to evacuate the population upriver or down to the sea were smashed as the crabs advanced, moving with deliberate power…

…And heading right towards the Town Hall.

Cursing, Robin left the barricade’s defenders to fend for themselves and started to run.  Even as he moved, he realised that he would never make it in time.

Chapter Twenty-Six

No one had ever seriously expected to have to use the war room.  Thomas Cromwell’s predecessors had feared the power of the nobility, yet they’d been confident that the peace enforced by Merlin would remain in place.  Even when Merlin had departed, the city fathers had been reluctant to rehearse their defence plans.  It might have outraged the Privy Council, or the House of Lords.  Now, Thomas found himself staring down at a paper map, outdated almost as soon as it was updated.  Messengers ran in and out, shouting updates to the councillors, while a single communications magician tried valiantly to keep in touch with the city’s remaining magicians.  The entire scene was chaos.

“They’re breaking through the West Gate,” a voice shouted.  Thomas winced; the South and North Gates had already broken, allowing a tidal wave of monsters the chance to push their way into the city.  The slums surrounding the outskirts of the city were already gone, either in flaming ruin or smashed by the advancing army.  He didn't want to think about what might have happened to those who hadn't fled in time.  “They’re pushing the Guard back to the barricades!”

“They’re bombing the housing in Brixton Plaza,” another messenger shouted.  That wasn't good news; Brixton Plaza held housing for senior factory workers and lower-class merchants.  Some of the families living there were surprisingly wealthy.  “We need magician cover, now!”

“There isn’t any magical cover,” the communications magician snapped.  Calling him a magician was being generous; he could barely muster the magic to send mental communications to his fellow magicians.  He was only here because he was little use to the Magicians Circle.  “Every time we try to strike at the Dark Sorcerers, they push us down and suppress us!”

Thomas tried to tune it out, studying the map.  He had no military experience – apart from a brief stint in the Guards, a vital necessity for one who might have to command them – but he was sure that he could see a pattern emerging.  The poorer parts of the city were being ransacked, with the invading army looting, raping and burning its way through the ramshackle housing, yet they weren’t targeting either the factories or the richer parts of the city.  It made little sense.  Everyone knew that the Dark Sorcerers thrived on chaos, so why were they trying to spare the most important and wealthy parts of the city?

“We need reinforcements at the northern barricades,” a third messenger bellowed.  He was sweating; he’d run past several burning city blocks on his desperate flight to the Town Hall.  “They’re on the verge of falling!”

“Sir Robin has deserted the barricades,” a fourth voice snapped.  “He’s fleeing into the city!”

Thomas focused, trying to think.  Everyone knew that most humans who were touched by wild magic retained their intelligence, even though they lacked human form and were driven away by their former friends and family.  Could it be that the monsters wanted the city for themselves?  Or was there a deeper plan at work?  There was no way to tell; as far as he knew, the monsters hadn't done anything as civilised as demanding the city’s surrender before they attacked.  His lips twitched humourlessly.  The last time a city had been attacked by an outside army, not including the skirmishes with the aristocratic armies, had been back during the Serpent Wars.  They had rarely ended well.

A hand shook him.  “Sir, Lord Mayor, they’re coming out of the water,” a voice snapped.  He turned to see one of the girls who handled clerical work in the Town Hall, her blouse stained with sweat and blood.  She’d volunteered to work in the medical corps, he recalled suddenly.  The blood wasn't hers.  “You have to get out of here!”

Thomas fought for mental stability.  “Who’s coming out of the water?”

“Monsters,” the girl blurted.  “You have to run!”

The entire building shook, echoing with the sudden sound of guns being fired from the rooftops.  Thomas had supervised the positioning of the weapons himself, intent on a desperate last stand.  Instead, he saw now what the monsters had been planning.  Attack the walls to draw off the reserves, then launch an attack from the river, capturing or killing the city’s leadership in one solid blow.

“Everyone out,” he bellowed.  He tried to think of where they could meet up and take control of the situation again.  An idea struck him and he smiled.  “We’ll meet at the Jolly Boar!”

There were some chuckles, swiftly suppressed as councillors and messengers started to evacuate the building.  The Jolly Boar was a pub further inland, one patronised by almost all of the city’s upper class.  It would serve as a base until they found somewhere better – and the invading army would never even suspect that it housed the city’s council.  At least it would buy them some time.

He was nearly out of the building when it started to shake.  They’d built it strong, knowing that they might have to fight to defend it one day, yet something was tearing it apart like paper.  Walls and ceilings started to crumble as something battered away at the far side of the building.  For a second, he watched, hypnotised by the destruction, before a hand caught him and pulled him towards the exit.  It was barely in time as a colossal claw smashed through the walls and waved about, knocking down the supports.  He had a moment to hope that the building would collapse on whatever was knocking it down, but as the creature came into view, he realised that it wouldn't do much harm.  A crab, almost as big as a house, was tearing the Town Hall apart.

Thomas ran for his life as the inhuman army advanced.  Guardsmen were trying to slow them down with gunfire, but bullets simply rebounded off their shells, or simply didn't inflict enough damage to slow them down.  A cannon would have worked better – he could see at least one seriously injured crab, lying where it had been hit – but the cannon had been destroyed when the building had been knocked down.  He saw the crab pick up one of the guardsmen and snap its claws, cutting him in half.  Blood tricked down onto the ruined building as the crab kept advancing.  A brave or foolish guardsman ran forward and hacked away at its scuttling legs with his sword, but the blade just glinted off the creature.  It squashed him casually and kept moving.

“Keep running,” he yelled, at a handful of office workers who had stopped to stare.  Others were fleeing in incoherent panic, terrified out of their wits.  They’d need dragons to stop the crabs, unless the magicians could throw up some kind of magical ward capable of stopping their advance.  “Get to the pub and get in touch with the Guard!  We’ll need cannon out here!”

Behind him, the monsters continued their advance.

***
Faye walked through the burning city, wrapped in a terrible power.  The few who tried to stop her, or didn't run away fast enough, were struck down with a wave of her hand.  A handful of young children had been caught and killed, allowing her a chance to bolster her magic reserves, for she’d been spending magic at a terrifying rate.  Somewhere through here, she’d been told, the city’s councillors would be trying to regroup and reassume command of the City Guard.  That could not be allowed to happen, not when reinforcements were doubtless already on the way from Camelot.  

She smiled as she saw a young man, barely old enough to marry, step out onto the streets.  He’d been captivated by her glamour, a projection of a young girl walking through the city, utterly untroubled by the chaos surrounding her.  She wondered absently where he’d been hiding – instead of joining the guardsmen or fleeing the chaos – but it hardly mattered.  A wave of her hand brought the young man over to her, clearly expecting a reward for his appearance.  The free cities tended to have an open-minded attitude to romance between young people, even through the Church disapproved.  She doubted that the young man was a virgin.  It was a pity, in a way; a virgin sacrifice was worth so much more.

A snap of her fingers froze him just before he reached her and he stopped, his eyes filled with surprise and horror.  Faye kissed him, shaping a charm with her mind, and the young man crumbled to dust.  Giggling a little as power flowed through her mind, she kicked the pile of dust and kept walking, occasionally pointing her finger at a building and blowing it apart, just for fun.  Sometimes she heard screams from inside the buildings as they collapsed, at other times she heard nothing.  It hardly mattered to her now.

She stopped and looked up as something intruded on her magical senses.  There was an Object of Power nearby, one so powerful that it should have been detectable from well outside the city.  Forgetting her mission, Faye started to run through the burning streets, following the lure.  It kept tickling the back of her mind with odd familiarity, just before she turned a corner and saw a figure in white-gold armour running up towards the Town Hall.  The sword in his hand glowed with brilliant light.  It had to be Excalibur – and Sir Robin.  Faye didn't hesitate.  She shaped a curse with her mind and launched it towards the target.  If she could take Excalibur, her master would be pleased with her...and if she could figure out how to use the sword, she would soon be the mistress of the Dark Sorcerers.

Laughing, she sent a second curse, and then a third.

***
Robin never saw the attack coming until Excalibur screamed a warning into his mind.  A flash of bright red light struck his armour, hurling him forwards; if he hadn't been holding the sword it would have killed him outright.  He hit the ground and rolled over, bringing up the sword to block and deflect a second pair of curses.  A figure, standing in the shadows, made a gesture and another wave of power struck him.  It took all of his strength to remain upright as power crackled around him.

A Dark Sorcerer, he realised.  He took a look as the figure stepped into the light and realised that he’d mistaken her for a man.  Even wearing Sorcerers Black, the figure was unmistakably female.  His Sight showed him a badly scarred woman, who might have been attractive if dark sorcery hadn't claimed its price for power.  A Dark Sorceress.

The Sorceress didn't seem to have realised that she might have made a mistake.  She kept tossing curses at him, each one harmlessly deflected or absorbed by Excalibur.  Robin gritted his teeth – every time a curse struck the blade, his fingers tingled unpleasantly – and started to walk towards her.  She lifted a wand, spoke a word that sounded like glass breaking, and the ground under his feet seemed to come alive.  Robin leapt backwards as lava flowed upwards and congealed into the rough shape of a man, eyes and a mouth appearing on the blocky misshapen head.  It turned and swung an extending fist towards him, almost knocking him down.  Cursing under his breath, Robin lifted the sword and sliced its arm off, letting it crash harmlessly to the ground.  The monster howled, a sound that was very far from human, and stamped forward.  It grew a new arm as it moved.

Robin hopped backwards, ducking and dodging as it kept swinging at him.  There was nothing elegant in its movements, but it didn't have to be, not when it could regenerate from any blow he landed.  And somehow he doubted that this creature would be bothered by a fire.  It's skin seemed to be burning already.  The Sorceress tossed another curse at him and Robin ducked, allowing the curse to strike the monster she’d created.  He’d hoped that her magic would destroy her creation, but nothing happened.  That would have been too easy.

He lunged forward, allowing Excalibur to guide his strikes, and started to slash away at the beast.  It disintegrated around him in a shower of rock and lava, yet before he could do anything else it started to form again.  The beast lashed out with a half-formed hand and struck him right on the chest.  His armour absorbed most of the blow, but it sent him flying backwards and into a wall.  He almost dropped the sword from the shock.  The Sorceress let out a cackle – drunk on her own power, he realised – and started to cast a darker spell.  Reality itself seemed to shimmer as something started pressing against the borders of the human world.  She was calling something out of the Darkness!

Robin ran forward, heedless of the danger, and rammed Excalibur through the tear in reality.  The Sorceress let out a howl as the sword sliced through her spell, but she vanished in a flash of green light as Robin attempted to decapitate her.  He cursed her as her stone monster kept advancing on him, intent on smashing him to a pulp.  Its glowing red eyes seemed to blaze with hatred and inhuman fury.  It seemed completely indestructible, even with Excalibur...

There’s always a way, he thought.  It’s burning skin gave him an idea and he started to jump backwards, hunting for an underground pipe.  The city’s designers had known about the relationship between tainted water and bad health and they’d created a network of underground pipes that rivalled anything the Romans had ever created, even at the height of their power.  The beast came lumbering after him, seemingly unconcerned that its mistress had left it to fight and win – or die.  Robin waited until it was in the right spot, and then dived between its legs, slicing down at the stone cobbles covering the ground.  As he had hoped, the beast lunged for him and toppled over, nearly squashing Robin beneath its bulk.  Excalibur sliced through the underground pipe and a colossal stream of water exploded up from under the monster.  The water flashed to steam almost instantly, but as he watched, the monster started to die.  It came apart into a hail of flaming rocks, and then melted away.

There was no time to enjoy his victory.  He jumped upwards, prompted by the sword, as a curse shot at him from behind.  Robin turned to see the Sorceress, desperately casting spell after spell.  He defected them all calmly and started to run, unwilling to allow her any more time to summon something nasty.  A moment later, he realised what she had in mind as the debris around her started to levitate into the air and fly right at his face.  It was a cunning move, he realised with a sudden flicker of admiration, perhaps the only way to use magic against a man holding Excalibur.  A physical impact could still hurt him.

The sword slashed through the air, shattering rocks and bricks, but there were just too many of them.  One clanged against his armour, sending him backwards; a second banged against his left arm.  A third struck his right hand and it opened, letting go of the sword.  Before he could recover, a fourth slammed right into his head.  His mind seemed to explode, and then collapse into darkness...

***
Faye caught her breath as she saw the Knight fall.  She hadn't realised how powerful Excalibur was, despite all the rumours, until she saw it casually absorbing her strongest curses.  Challenging the Knight had been a misjudgement, one that could have cost her everything – and she’d abandoned her mission to challenge him.  And yet, she’d knocked him out and captured Excalibur!  Her master would be delighted!

She stepped forward carefully and examined the sword.  It glowed with power and she reached down for the hilt, before catching herself.  An instinct warned her that touching Excalibur without proper preparation would be very dangerous, perhaps fatal.  Indeed, she was sure that it wasn't really a sword, but something else, something utterly beyond her comprehension.  It seemed to exist in more than three dimensions.  She didn't dare touch it.  Instead, she used her magic to form a protective sheath around the blade and levitated it into the air.  It should have been impossible, but somehow she was sure that she could still feel the sword’s magic pulsing away inside the sheath.  It felt as if the sword was burning its way through the cover.

The Dark Sorcerers had discussed Excalibur ever since the blade had resurfaced, before it had killed many of them at the Summer Palace.  Excalibur was a legend in its own right, the sword that had made Arthur King of England and allowed him to shape a Golden Age.  Even in the hands of someone who didn't really know what it was, or how to use it, it had slaughtered Dark Sorcerers and come alarmingly close to killing her.  It was a legend...

And yet, even legends had a hard kernel of truth.  Given time, she was sure that the Dark Sorcerers could figure out how to control the blade – and how to turn it against its former masters.  At Beneficence, she’d been taught that every Object of Power, even the ones with murky origins like Excalibur, could be mastered and eventually duplicated by enchanters and alchemists.  Excalibur was powerful, but it was far from all-powerful.  It could be mastered.

Shaking her head, she bent down to check on Sir Robin.  The Knight had been knocked cold, but his armour had protected him from an impact that should have killed him outright.  Removing the armour was beyond her power; the spells Merlin’s lapdogs had woven into it would ensure that removing it would kill the bearer.  Faye considered for a moment, and then placed her arms around Sir Robin, carefully shaping a teleportation spell in her mind.  There was a flash of green light and they both vanished from the field.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

From above, great plumes of smoke marred Londinium.

Eleanor felt her dragon’s wings beating frantically as he swooped down towards the battle, leading seven other dragons into the fray.  Her mental link with the beast – which had cost her any hope of a normal life or relationship – shimmered with cold delight at the thought of combat.  The semi-intelligent dragon hatchlings that were handed over to the Garrison by their parents never developed true intelligence.  They took delight in fighting and in their bond with a human who provided the brains of the partnership.  Anyone who got between a dragon and its rider was risking life and limb.

Through the link, she could see what the dragon saw with its far sharper eyes – and magical senses.  Dark figures hovered high over the city, occasionally casting spells down towards the flaming ruins below.  Giant birds, some almost as large as a full-sized dragon, flew through the smoke, seemingly unbothered by the heat rising from the fires they’d helped to start.  An army of monsters, some human, some very far from human, was pushing its way into the city.  And thousands of humans lay dead, killed by the invading forces.  Cold anger burned through Eleanor’s mind and shimmered into the dragon.  Those responsible would not go unpunished.

The dragon howled and opened its mouth, blowing a long stream of fire towards the Dark Sorcerers.  A full-grown dragon could throw fire a considerable distance – and the magicians at the Garrison had improved the hatchlings they’d been given, to the point where they could throw their fire for nearly a mile.  One Dark Sorcerer had almost no time to turn before he found himself wrapped in flames, burning through his wards.  Perhaps he could have held it off on the ground, but floating up in the air it spelled his death warrant.  Unable to maintain both the wards and the floatation spell, he found himself plummeting towards the ground and hitting it with a splat.  No one, not even a Dark Sorcerer, could have survived such an impact.

Eleanor twisted the dragon’s path as the other Dark Sorcerers scattered, casting angry spells towards the dragons.  They would have been lethal if they’d struck her or one of the other riders, but dragons were among the most magical creatures to dwell on the mundane world.  Their skin repelled almost all charms and curses, deflecting them back towards the enemy or knocking them harmlessly towards the ground.  Eleanor felt the dragon’s glee as it twisted in the air, a trick that had caught a hundred enemies in the past, and snapped at one of the Dark Sorcerers.  The man let out a yelp and vanished in a flash of green light, seconds before the dragon’s jaws snapped shut.  Eleanor had to smile at the dragon’s outrage; it had been cheated of its prey.  It roared its fury and threw a great gout of fire towards the nearest Dark Sorcerer.

The beating of the dragon’s wings was pushing the smoke aside, allowing her to look down with her merely human eyes.  Giant crabs – escorted by what looked like warped mermaids – were advancing through the centre of the city, ruthlessly destroying everything in their path.  Eleanor shuddered as one of the crabs seemed to look upwards, snapping its claws towards the dragon.  She was used to huge beasts – dragons were larger than a house; the largest of them were larger than the Iron Palace had been – and yet the crabs sent unpleasant shivers down her spine.  They were slow and cumbersome, unable to actually capture buildings their bulk sent crashing down in ruins, but they were effective terror weapons.

She pushed her mind into the dragon’s mind and directed it down towards the ground.  The dragon resisted for a long moment – it wanted to keep hunting Dark Sorcerers and snapping giant birds out of the air – before reluctantly following her command.  Eleanor braced herself as the dragon spiralled down towards the first crab and blew a vast gout of fire over the beast.  The crab lifted its giant claws to defend itself, emitting a high-pitched keening that hurt Eleanor’s ears, but it wasn't enough to save it.  Or perhaps it was; the crab’s shell had absorbed the heat, without cooking the softer flesh inside.  A second gout of fire sent the crab scuttling backwards, yet it was still unharmed.

The dragon’s mind radiated fury – it couldn't comprehend defiance – and it came to a half, hovering just above the ground.  Its craws reached down and snatched the crab, its mighty wings beating a path up into the air.  The crab was heavy enough to slow the ascent, but not heavy enough to save itself.  Eleanor watched in amusement as it struggled to free itself, claws and legs waving away helplessly at the air, before the dragon let go.  The crab plummeted a hundred meters to the ground and came down on its back.  It seemed injured, but even at full strength it couldn't have turned itself over.  Eleanor grinned as the dragon aimed a vast plume of fire at the crab’s exposed – and vulnerable – underside and cooked the beast.  Other dragons were following her beast’s example, apart from one that had decided to challenge a crab to single combat.  A snapping claw cut off its head and smashed the rider to a bloody pulp.  

Eleanor cursed as her dragon roared its anger and went after the treacherous crab.  The crab was trying to retreat, but it was far too late.  Her dragon caught its legs, tipped it over easily and jammed its teeth and claws into the exposed underbelly.  Crab meat flew everywhere as it ripped the monster apart.  Eleanor caught snatches of its emotions as it swallowed large pieces of meat, even though she tried to deter it, knowing that the pieces of this crab might start coming together inside the dragon’s belly and then try to gnaw their way out.  The Healers who cured cancer used live crabs to assist their rituals.  Afterwards, the crabs had to be boiled and then buried under the sand.  Eating them was deadly dangerous.

The dragon – either in response to her prompts or because it had satisfied its hunger – leapt back into the air.  They’d killed all the crabs – the scuttling beasts hadn't had a chance to retreat – but there was still a mighty army burning its way into the city.  The dragon roared and swept down towards one of the army’s prongs, composed of humanoid monsters who started to scatter when they saw the dragon.  It was far too late.  The fire the dragon breathed down upon them was too powerful to avoid, an endless stream that vaporised whatever it touched.  Hundreds of monsters simply vanished in the flames.  Eleanor found herself praying, as the eerie glow of dragon fire gave way to more conventional flames, that they hadn't incinerated surviving humans as well.  No one would know, now or ever.

A hail of arrows, guided by simple charms, flashed into the air, only to glint off the dragon’s scaly green underbelly.  The monsters didn't lack for courage, Eleanor realised, although it wouldn't help them escape.  The dragon twisted and blew down another gout of flame, incinerating the archers, the buildings they were standing on and several buildings too close to the original buildings.  The flames were rapidly spreading out of control.  Even if they drove off the monsters, they might be unable to save the city.  With most of the Garrison’s available forces in Tara, they wouldn't even have reinforcements coming to fight the flames.

The dragon soared into the sky and roar, blowing a bright wave of fire through the air.  Eleanor watched through its eyes as the monsters began to retreat, heading back towards the gates they’d broken down to enter the city.  None of them were trying to surrender, but that was hardly a surprise, not when many of them had been driven from humanity’s towns and villages simply because they’d been touched by wild magic.  A handful were trying to continue the fight, yet the advancing guardsmen – having taken heart from the arrival of the dragons – were able to swiftly dispose of them.  The battle was almost won.

A flash of green light rocketed up from the ground and struck one of the dragons.  Eleanor watched in horror as green light cascaded over the beast, seconds before its wings folded and it plummeted helplessly towards the ground.  There was magic running through the dragon’s body – nothing so large could fly without magic – and the Dark Sorcerer had somehow managed to cancel the natural magic that powered the dragon’s flight.  The beast struck the ground and went up in a colossal fireball as the magical field protecting its insides collapsed.  

Eleanor caught her dragon and pointed it down towards the ground.  The Dark Sorcerer was roaring and chanting, summoning power from the Darkness to kill a second dragon.  She caught sight of him through her dragon’s eyes and recoiled.  The dark sorcery he used was eating away at his flesh, aging him before his time.  He might not have realised it, but he was far too close to becoming a lich, an undead skeleton.  And a lich could be very dangerous.

The dragon plummeted towards the Dark Sorcerer, breathing fire down onto his wards.  They held as dragon fire flared over the shield, but the building under his feet couldn't hope to stand up to the flames.  It caught fire instantly, sending the Dark Sorcerer tumbling through the roof and crashing down into the debris.  Maybe he’d survived – Eleanor’s dragon blasted flame through the rubble, just to be sure – but he was definitely out of the fight.

She smiled grimly as the dragon clawed its way back into the sky.  If nothing else, they’d taught the Greenwood monsters a lesson.  Perhaps they’d be less eager to listen to the Dark Sorcerers in future.

***
Maledict felt power roaring through his bones as he lashed out, shattering part of the barricades the defenders had hastily erected.  A hail of arrows, knives and axes rained down around him, but they glinted helplessly off the wards he’d created to protect him.  The defenders didn't have a chance.  Dark flames – a spell long forbidden by Merlin and believed to be lost, before he’d uncovered an ancient spellbook – cascaded over the rubble.  Those caught by the fire wouldn't burn, but they’d lose their souls and become monsters.  If they survived the experience, their comrades would cut them down before they could flee.

He found himself giggling, just before he saw a golden flicker of fire in the corner of his eye.  The wards glowed as a vast wave of fire flashed down and struck his defences.  He forgot the defenders and pulled the wards around him, channelling his last ounce of strength into defending himself.  The fires faded away, revealing a dragon hovering just a few meters above the ground, staring down at him with great golden eyes.  Maledict met its eyes and, just for a second, he found himself daunted by the beast.  He might have wielded magic, but the dragon was magic – and the bare breasts of its rider taunted him, reminding him of what he’d given up in his quest for power.

Angrily, he snapped off a pair of spells, both aimed at the rider.  The dragon’s head darted up sharply and both spells were absorbed harmlessly by its green scales.  Maledict had heard of spells that allowed sorcerers to control a whole flock of dragons, yet countless hours of research had never uncovered them.  The Garrison knew some spells, but they’d been devised by Merlin and they were – intentionally, he suspected – limited.  The dragon’s mouth lolled open, clearly preparing to unleash another dose of fire - and Maledict teleported away.  Dragon fire was magical too, powerful enough that it might burn through his wards.

He appeared on a rooftop, one of the tallest remaining buildings in the city.  The attack was being beaten back by the dragons, he saw, but that hardly mattered.  The Greenwood monsters were expendable.  He didn't care if they all died in the fighting.  All that mattered was power – and although it looked like his side was losing, they’d already won.  He smiled as he saw which parts of the city had been spared; the factories, some of the wealthier sections and even some of the housing.  The Duke would be pleased.

Another dragon flew overhead and Maledict teleported away, back to the rendezvous point.  Faye sat there, staring down at a figure in white-gold armour.  Maledict felt his mouth fall open in shock as he realised just who – and what – Faye had captured.  The glow from the supernatural sword, even concealed within a sheath of wood, drew him to it like a moth to a flame.  Only his natural caution, the same caution that had prevented his dark sorcery from burning through his soul and wiping him from existence, kept him from touching the blade.

“He’s alive,” Faye said, slowly.  She knelt to him, but Maledict knew better than to take her submission at face value.  After capturing such a valuable prize, perhaps the most valuable prize of all, she would have ambitions for her future.  There had never been a woman leading Dark Sorcerers, but Faye would hardly allow that thought to stop her.  If she thought she could dispose of him safely, she would.  “I can't remove his armour.”

Maledict peered at it through his Sight.  The armour was held together by intricate spells, some bound to the wearer’s very soul.  It would be simple enough to kill him, but Sir Robin was the husband of the First Councillor.  His value as a hostage would be considerable.  Maledict contemplated the spells for a long moment, and then cast a simple sleeping spell.  Sir Robin wouldn’t wake up for hours.  By then, they’d be back home – and they’d have all the time they needed to undo his armour and start twisting him with their magic.  The thought of having Lady Tiffany assassinated by her own husband almost made him giggle.  Without Merlin’s wards, who would they know they could trust?

“Get him back home,” he ordered.  Faye could do that, and see that he was settled in before he awoke.  “I’ll stay here until we’re ready to leave.”

Faye vanished in a flash of green light, taking Sir Robin and his sword with her.  Maledict frowned, and then teleported himself, back onto the burning streets.  The fires were spreading further now, partly because of the magic the Dark Sorcerers had woven into the original flames, but also partly because the dragons were making it worse.  Their flames were devouring entire regiments of Greenwood monsters.  The army Maledict had brought to the city was in full retreat, back to the Greenwood.  Somehow, he doubted that many of them would escape before they were killed by the outraged citizens.

He threw himself into the air and soared over the city.  The flames rose higher as he laughed out loud, enjoying the sight.  He’d worked his will on the land and the broken city below stood in silent testament to his deeds.  This was true power; this was what Merlin had sought to deny the human race.  After today, everyone would fear his followers – or seek to become like them.  Even if the attack was beaten off – and the dragons were driving his monsters back – the city had still been devastated.

Another cackle escaped his lips.  The power flared through him, calling him onwards.  He could do anything now, anything at all.  It crossed his mind that he could challenge the Duke now, remove his wards and make the man his helpless slave, but he pushed the thought aside.  It was far more amusing to let the Duke believe that they were allies, or that Maledict was prepared to be subordinate to him, before the time came to end the charade.  Besides, some of the lesser Dark Sorcerers were already in Camelot, laying the grounds for the next offensive.  And that one would start his final bid for power...

Chuckling, he closed his eyes and signalled the retreat.  It was time to go.

Behind them, the city burned.

***
Once the Dark Sorcerers had departed, the outcome of the battle was no longer in doubt.  Eleanor and the remaining dragons harried the remaining monsters until they crossed the closest boundary line and escaped into the Greenwood.  She was tempted to continue the pursuit, but exposure to too much wild magic might be incredibly dangerous.  Instead, she directed the dragons back towards the city to assist in fire fighting.  Now the battle was over, the entire city had turned out to fight the fires.

The remaining magicians – reinforced by a team of combat magicians who had been rocketed down from Camelot – were casting spells into the river, sucking out great streams of water and directing them into the heart of the fires.  The guardsmen were working desperately to evacuate entire sections of the city, before knocking them down to prevent the fire from spreading further.  Hundreds of thousands of people who had lost everything in the attack were helping as best as they could, forming fire chains and transporting buckets of water to the flames.  Even the dragons helped, using their wings to create vast gusts of wind that blew out entire fires.

Eleanor directed the dragon to rise up into the air, above the burning city.  Even from above, it was clear that the attack – for all of its violence – had been surprisingly selective.  Some parts of the city had remained untouched.  She frowned, stroking her chin in puzzlement.  Had the monsters dreamed they’d be allowed to retain possession of the city?  Or was something else at work here?

Shaking her head, she directed the dragon down towards the ground.  There were fires to fight.  The mystery of what the enemy had hoped to achieve would have to wait.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“There’s no sign of him?”

“No, My Lady,” the Guardsman said.  “Sir Robin is missing – and so is Excalibur.”

Tiffany felt as if she had been punched in the stomach.  She’d sent Robin to Londinium, hoping that his commoner birth and his possession of Excalibur would allow him to appeal to the city fathers.  Instead, she’d sent him to his…death?  No, he couldn’t be dead; her wedding ring was still warm.  He wasn't dead…but if they couldn’t find him, he was almost certainly a captive, or trapped.  And if he was missing, what had happened to Excalibur?

“You couldn’t get a magician to sense the sword?”

“We tried, once we realised that he was missing,” Cromwell said.  The Lord Mayor looked haggard, as if he’d aged a thousand years overnight.  Tiffany had once watched a sorcerer lose control of his rejuvenation spells, all his years catching up with him at once.  Cromwell was no sorcerer, yet he looked ancient.  “The remaining magicians tried to search for him and the sword and drew a blank.”

That wasn't good, Tiffany knew.  Magical searches had their limits – they hadn’t for Merlin, a treacherous part of her mind pointed out – but they should have been able to locate Robin, even if he’d been transfigured into a toad or something equally unpleasant.  If he couldn’t be found, it meant that he was in the Greenwood – or somewhere warded against magical detection.  And either one suggested that he was a prisoner, a captive of the Dark Sorcerers.

She’d taken the time to look up some of the legends surrounding Excalibur, but few of them could be verified.  The sword protected its bearer from harm, according to some sources, yet others claimed that it was the jewelled scabbard that came with the sword.  King Arthur had once lost the scabbard to a ruthless enemy who had worn it himself and nearly killed the King before Merlin intervened – or so the legends claimed.  It was a far cry from the sword making its bearer invincible.  But then, no Object of Power, no matter how powerful, could be trusted completely.  They tended to have minds of their own.

Smoke was still rising from the ruined parts of the city.  Thousands of bodies, often burned beyond recognition, were being pulled out of the wreckage and transported to the mass grave that was being dug for them, outside the city.  There would be no time for proper funerals, unless the body was clearly recognisable and the family well-connected.  Besides, with so much wild magic running around, there was a distant chance that the bodies would get up again and start attacking the living.  Zombies were deadly dangerous – and she wouldn't have been surprised if the Dark Sorcerers had been willing to add raising the dead to their long list of crimes.

The city fathers, those who had survived the battle, looked shocked.  She couldn’t blame them; over the years, they had built up a formidable position…but now it had been practically destroyed overnight.  The city had depended upon its population to make it work, to serve as one of the foremost production facilities in the Empire, and now half the population had been slaughtered.  She wasn't blind to the selective nature of the destruction – which suggested that the Dark Sorcerers had had other motives than simple destruction – and yet, she wondered if they had wrecked the city beyond repair.  The destroyed workforce would have to be replenished before the city could start producing again.

A shadow fell over them and hands reached for weapons, before they realised that it was merely a dragon.  Tiffany had ordered two entire flocks of dragons to remain near the city, although it was little more than an attempt to reassure people that they hadn’t been forgotten by their protectors.  The Dark Sorcerers were unlikely to return to the city in force.  They’d be more likely to hit somewhere else, somewhere undefended.  With most of the Garrison massed in Tara, they had a surfeit of possible targets.

“We took no prisoners, My Lady,” Cromwell said, when she asked.  Tiffany wasn't surprised.  Dark Sorcerers knew better than to let themselves be taken captive – and few would try to capture a monster from the Greenwood.  It was far better to slaughter the creatures before they spread wild magic into human settlements.  “They retreated when the dragons arrived, teleporting out before they could be killed.”

Tiffany nodded, bitterly.  Only sorcerers could teleport – and there weren’t that many sorcerers in the House of Magus.  And they were all occupied with the power struggle to replace the High Magus.  The Dark Sorcerers had a powerful advantage…or did they?  They could go anywhere that wasn’t shielded by wards…

She put the thought aside for later consideration and turned to the Lord Mayor.  “What do you need from Camelot?”

Cromwell answered at once.  “Help rebuilding and a tax rebate for the year,” he said, instantly.  “We still have most of the money we put aside for a rainy day – but this was a flood.  We won’t be able to pay many taxes this year…”

And they might not pay, even if they could.  Tiffany scowled.  The Empire’s economy was more fragile than it seemed, now that Merlin – the ultimate power in the Empire – was gone.  The city’s wealth had been invested in its factories and workforce and now much of that workforce had been destroyed.  She frowned, puzzled.  If the Dark Sorcerers had wanted to save the factories, they’d still crippled them – and that suggested they hadn’t really understood what they were doing.  An aristocrat would think in terms of controlling land, not a workforce.  Had Duke Blackrock made a few suggestions to his allies, or was something else going on here?

“We’ll do what we can,” she promised, vaguely.  If Londinium didn’t pay its taxes, the Empire would be short on money for the coming year.  And that would make it harder to pay all the civil servants who made the Empire work, let alone the Garrison troops and combat magicians who provided the punch when necessary.  Combat magicians didn’t work cheap.  “Until then…”

She allowed her gaze to wander over the ruined city.  It hadn’t taken long for the Dark Sorcerers to smash Londinium beyond easy recovery, less than six hours.  Once the word got out – and it was already spreading, she was sure – the panic would begin.  Any hope of borrowing city guardsmen to reinforce the forces in Tara had been destroyed beyond repair.  And that might have been the ultimate purpose of the attack…

Tiffany frowned.  “Who else is missing?”

Cromwell snorted.  “Thousands of people,” he said, sardonically.  “We may never know what happened to them.”

She accepted the rebuke without comment.  She’d wondered if the Dark Sorcerers had been interested in kidnapping others from the city, but Cromwell was right.  With so many bodies burned beyond recognition, or tainted by wild magic, it would be impossible to tell if any had been taken prisoner and marched back to wherever the Dark Sorcerers were using as a base.  In fact, the dragon riders that had chased the monsters back to the Greenwood had reported that the nearby boundary lines were on the verge of collapse…and that wild magic seemed to be shimmering past the barrier.  What would happen, she asked herself, if the Greenwood started to expand?  How much wild magic had Merlin kept penned up in there over the years?

Shaking her head, she tried to concentrate on the city.  It wasn't easy.  Every time she felt a pulse of heat from her ring, she thought of Robin.  Lost, alone…and a captive of the Dark Sorcerers.  His body might be returned to her one day, yet she knew what they did to their captives.  Robin’s mind might never be his own again.  And he would rather die than become a puppet for a dark master…

***
The destruction stretched as far as the eye could see.

Lucas peered through the carriage’s window as the horses pulled the vehicle through the ruins.  His father’s personal guard, wearing the yellow and black uniforms that his great-great-great grandfather had designed, had fanned out around the coach to keep the rabble away from their aristocratic masters.  Even so, Lucas saw enough suffering people to last him a lifetime.  There were men cradling their dead wives, women wailing for their lost children and sobbing children, too young to understand that their parents wouldn't be coming home.  The recovery teams – including a contingent his father had sent down from their lands as a political gesture – were working ceaselessly.  He feared that it wouldn't be enough to save much of the population.

“Runaways,” his father growled, when Lucas tried to share his new insight with him.  He scowled at his own mistake.  His father wouldn't feel any compassion for people who had fled his lands, preferring to seek their own destiny rather than work for him for the rest of their lives, surviving on what little he graciously allowed them to keep.  “Don’t waste your time with pity or sympathy.  These people are our enemies, men who seek to overturn the order that has governed this land since Merlin created the Empire.”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said.  He fought to keep his voice level, but it wasn’t easy.  If his father had heard the undertone, he said nothing.  It took everything he had to conceal his disgust; luckily, his father wasn’t paying much attention to his son.  He was too busy considering how to spin the disaster to his own advantage.  

The couch rattled suddenly as a stone bounced off the wooden roof.  Lucas reached for his sword instinctively, but there was really no need.  The guards yelled and lashed around them with their whips, driving the stone-thrower and his friends away from the vehicle.  Lucas had had only a moment to catch the helpless fury in their faces before one of them was knocked to the ground and trampled on by the guards.  The remainder made their escape before the guards could catch up with them.  He found himself hoping that the stone-thrower survived the experience, but it didn’t seem likely.  His father only recruited the most brutal of guards, preferring men of violence to men of thought.  They came from peasant families, too hungry to care that they were trained to turn against their own kind, and were hated by their former families.  His father had been adroit in ensuring that they had nowhere else to go.

A stench caught his nostrils and he gagged, covering his nose with his sleeve.  Outside, the coach was rumbling past the remains of a giant monster, already decaying now that it had been killed by the defenders.  Lucas swallowed hard as he caught sight of the claws and scaly legs; even upside down, the giant crab was terrifying.  Small parties of men were cutting away at his flesh, trying to cook it and prepare it for the families who’d lost everything.  A less desperate crowd would play it safe and refuse to touch the meat, but they were desperate.

He’d never visited the city’s Town Hall before, but he’d seen pictures.  It had once been a magnificent structure, remarkable even in a world where magic could shape castles out of cloud, or place them on top of a needle-thin line.  Now…it was just a pile of debris, with recovery parties struggling to pull bodies out of the wreckage.  He heard a faint sound from his father and looked up, only to see a cold smile flittering across his father’s face.  It hadn’t occurred to him that his father would take pleasure in so much devastation, but the Town Hall had been a living symbol of defiance, the pride of a population largely drawn from escaped peasants.  And now it was just a pile of rubble.

Lucas looked away, back out of the window.  A dragon was sitting on the ground, golden eyes looking around with dull unconcern.  Lucas had once met a true dragon – one of the handful of dragon hatchlings that grew into intelligence – and had been struck by the ancient wisdom in the being’s eyes.  The dragon in front of him was nothing more than a beast, mastered by its rider.  He felt a familiar stirring as he caught sight of the rider – a dark-skinned woman wearing nothing more than a belt – before he pushed it away.  Even a spoiled brat knew better than to get between a dragon and its rider.

The coach rattled to a stop in front of an intact building and his father opened the door, allowing one of the guardsmen to help him down onto the ground.  Lucas followed a moment later, jumping down neatly while keeping one hand on his sword.  Even away from the dead monster, the city still smelled of burning flesh and wood.  He wondered how long it would be before the wind blew the stench away.

“Come,” his father said, imperiously.  He led the way up a flight of steps and rapped once on the door with his cane.  The door opened at once, revealing a maid who dropped a curtsey when she realised who was at the door.  His father studied her thoughtfully just long enough to make her uncomfortable, and then introduced himself.  “I believe that we’re expected?”

“Yes, My Lord,” she said.  She had the manners down pat, Lucas realised.  He wondered if she’d grown up on a farm before fleeing to the city.  “If you will follow me…”

Inside, the building was remarkably luxurious, if tasteless.  Pieces of art were scattered around, chosen more for their cost than for any aesthetic sense.  A golden statue of a naked woman turned slightly as they approached, her golden lips curving up into a smile.  Magic…or perhaps a clockwork toy.  Either was possible in a free city.  A small selection of bladed weapons hung on one wall, awaiting the call to action.  Absently, he wondered why they hadn’t been drawn when the city was under attack.

The room the maid showed them into was rather more tasteful, although he couldn’t see how it could have been less tasteful.  It was both comfortable and formal, with a table for meetings and a set of comfortable chairs for less formal gatherings.  Lucas settled down onto one of the chairs and started to relax, before his father glared at him and he stumbled to his feet.  There was an unspoken etiquette for such meetings and he'd broken it.  He concealed a flush and waited until the inner door slipped open and Lord Randolph stepped into the room.

“I got your message,” he said, once they’d exchanged insincere greetings and enquires after each other’s heath.  “I trust you understand that the city is in a terrible mess at the moment?”

Lucas opened his mouth to say something cutting, but closed it again without saying a word.  His father was less restrained.

“Nothing should stand in the way of our projects,” he said, firmly.  “Are you prepared to launch a challenge against Cromwell and his…Reform Party?”

Lucas blinked, and then understood.  His father was a Conservative through and through, a man so conservative that he wouldn't have provided the Conservatives in Parliament with any actual support, let alone backing.  In his world, an aristocrat had had sole power within his lands and his will was all that counted.  But that wasn't true of the free cities – and it certainly wasn't true of the House of Commons.  And the House of Commons had a great deal of power, now that Merlin was gone, to affect taxes and tithes.

The plan was devilishly simple.  His father had encouraged the Dark Sorcerers to attack the city, warning them to concentrate their attacks on the poorer sections of the town.  They’d slaughtered the people who were most likely to be interested in upsetting the applecart – and vote Reform into power.  Thomas Cromwell might not have realised it yet, but his voting base had just been destroyed.  Lord Randolph, who was popular with the wealthier magnates and even some of the smaller business owners, would have a chance to unseat him as Lord Mayor.  And if that happened, the Speaker’s position in the House of Commons – which belonged, by tradition, to the Lord Mayor of Londinium – would fall into his hands.  And that would mean…

Tiffany’s position would become untenable.  There was no precedent for replacing a First Councillor, but now…she wouldn't be able to operate.  What few powers were vested in the Privy Council wouldn't be enough to save her from being replaced, or superseded if she refused to be replaced.  He looked up at his father and felt a flicker of admiration, drowned out by cold horror.  His father would take Tiffany’s place and then…give the Empire to the Dark Sorcerers.

“We are already preparing the challenge,” Lord Randolph assured them, as if he could already feel the weight of the gold chain falling around his neck.  The Lord Mayor of Londinium wore a golden chain to mark his power, one enchanted by Merlin himself.  “At least two of the councillors will need to be replaced – perhaps three if Councillor Dwight doesn’t show himself.  That will give us an edge…”

Lucas leaned forward.  “How can you be sure?”

His father gave him a single annoyed look.  “It’s really very simple,” he said, in the tones one would use to educate a particularly stupid child.  “There are twenty-one city councillors.  Reform held nine of them; the Conservatives held eight…and the remaining four were independent.  Now that two – perhaps three – Councillors will need to be replaced, the Conservatives will be in a position to dominate the council and select the next Lord Mayor.

“Do you understand me, son?”

“Yes, father,” Lucas said, meekly.  He thought hard, trying to find a way to block his father’s plan, but he could think of nothing.  Even without his father’s open backing – and that would raise doubts even among the most committed Conservatives – the plan would succeed.  And what would trying and failing gain him?  “I understand perfectly.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Pain.

Robin fought his way back to awareness through a sea of pain.  He’d thought he’d known what pain was, back when he’d grown up on the farm.  Pain was working hard in the fields for little return, or a thrashing from his father for forgetting to milk the family’s cow one morning.  And then he’d gone to the Garrison and pain was being forced to train endlessly, with far too little sleep.  And then he’d been Squired and discovered that riding after a Knight was painful too.

His entire body seemed to be burning.  Flames were crackling over his eyes, working their way into his skin.  He could have sworn that he smelt roasting flesh.  Desperately, he opened his mouth and tried to scream, but no sound reached his ears.  It had to be a nightmare, he told himself, yet he couldn’t wake up.  Another flash of pain seemed to resonate through his body and memory returned.  The sword, the duel with a sorceress…and then nothing, nothing at all.  He probed his memory desperately, but nothing emerged.  Was he dead and in Hell?

He heard the sound of terrible laughter echoing from outside and realised what had happened.  He wasn't dead, or in Hell; he was a captive of the Dark Sorcerers.  The thought galvanised his mind and he started to run through the mental disciplines that had been hammered into his head at the Garrison.  Words his teacher had spoken echoed down the years towards him.  Your body wanted to heal as much as you wanted it to heal; healing wasn't a contest between a mind and a body.  The disciplines helped young Knights handle pain and survive.  He concentrated, running through the prayers he could remember, and the burning slowly started to recede.

There were noises outside.  His ears were still ringing, but he was sure that he could make out the sounds of stamping feet – and of voices chanting in a language that had been old when the world was young.  Carefully, he managed to open his eyes, even though something had held them closed.  It took him a long moment to realise that it was crusted blood.  Whatever they’d done to him, however long he’d been their captive, it had left him badly injured.

The Dark Sorcerers surrounded him.  They were dancing, each one moving to a precise beat that involved stamping down hard, while chanting a ritual aloud.  Robin felt cold terror grip his mind for a long moment and forced it away, trying to understand what they were doing.  It reminded him of a sword dance, except that the Dark Sorcerers would hardly want to deflect swords from striking the good and godly.

He glanced down at himself and almost swore.  His armour was blackened and pitted from the charms they’d unleashed against it.  They’d crucified him, although they hadn’t driven nails through his arms, although he couldn’t see that as an encouraging sign.  His body was so weak that he couldn’t even begin to break free, at least not yet.  He looked around and saw other captives, standing a few meters from the Dark Sorcerers, their eyes dead and cold.  They’d been charmed into helpless obedience.

The Garrison had taught Robin how to navigate by the stars.  He looked up into the darkness, despite his ringing skull, and tried to locate himself.  It took longer than he would have expected to locate the vital stars and deduce that he was somewhere in Caledonia.  The Dark Sorcerers would want somewhere with a vast magical aura to hide themselves, which meant the Greenwood…or Kentigern.  It had to be Kentigern.  No one, even a power-mad Dark Sorcerer, would stay in the Greenwood for too long.

And he was a prisoner.  He knew what they did to their prisoners…

Raw panic, the kind he’d never felt since childhood, threatened to overwhelm him.  He fought it down, drawing on his mental link to Excalibur.  The sword was nowhere to be seen, but he could still feel the link that had formed the day he’d drawn the enchanted blade for the first time.  New strength flowed into his body, only to be drained away seconds later.  The Dark Sorcerers had enchanted the cross to ensure that he couldn’t regain his strength.

New faces entered the dance, their faces trapped in a cold bleak helplessness that was worse than anything Robin had ever seen.  Their other captives, women and children they’d taken from the city, bound into servitude by powerful spells.  As Robin watched, the Dark Sorcerers began to abuse them, forcing them to submit to their rituals.  The sense of diseased power flowing around the circle grew stronger, as if the Dark Sorcerers were drawing on the humiliation and fear of their captives.  A handful simply dropped dead, pushed beyond endurance or drained of life.  They were the lucky ones, Robin knew.  The rituals could go on for days.

He wanted to close his eyes as the blood started to flow, each act consecrated to the Darkness.  Somehow, he couldn’t look away as captives died, each one followed into the next world by a mocking laugh.  Robin started to pray within his mind, clinging to prayers he’d learned as a child.  Surely, the Dark Sorcerers were wrong; surely they couldn’t sell other souls to the Darkness.  And yet, somehow they were drawing power…

They pushed in around him, suddenly aware that he was awake and watching.  Their screams of laughter tore at his ears.  He recoiled from their mocking taunts and the sparks of fire that they flicked towards him, before the wave of magic closed in around him.  The laughter grew louder until it occupied the entire world…and Robin, mercifully, blacked out.

***
Excalibur floated on a stone table, its mere presence brightening the room.  The few Dark Sorcerers who had seen the glowing blade had recoiled, as if they could hide from its light by covering their eyes.  They’d taken the precaution of separating the sword and scabbard, leaving the latter on a second table, but it didn’t seem to dim the brilliant light.  The sword seemed bright enough to cut through the very fabric of reality itself.

And that would be among the least of the tales surrounding Excalibur.  King Arthur had used it, according to some stories, to cut open a pathway into Avalon when he’d waged war against the Faerie.  The Faerie had kidnapped a hundred human children and Arthur had walked into their world, carrying nothing, but Excalibur and his determination to do the right thing.  He’d walked out of Avalon, afterwards, with the children and a binding promise that the Faerie would steal no more children while Arthur was alive.  Other stories, darker ones, suggested that Arthur had been reshaped by the sword, turned from just another warlord into a man fit to rule the world.

But Arthur had been far from the only one to wield Excalibur.  There were stories that told of it passing from hand to hand, each wielder transforming the world before the blade left them and waited for the next person to pick it up and use it – if they were worthy.  Alexander the Great had conquered almost the entire known world carrying Excalibur; Cleopatra had passed it on to her Roman lover, Julius Caesar, believing that he could keep her kingdom safe.  Caesar had feared the blade and refused to carry it with him, only to meet his death on the Ides of March.  And his adopted son, who became the first formal Roman Emperor, recovered the blade and used it to establish his rule, before the sword passed back into history.  After Arthur, and Merlin, it had vanished completely, until now.

Maledict studied the sword, silently cursing the blade’s sheer presence.  Looking at it through his Sight was impossible for more than a few moments, for the blade shone with power.  It was like staring into a light so bright that even the merest glimpse would bring blindness.  Even so, he could sense – as the sword pulsed with power – endless waves of power plunging down into infinity, a strata of power beyond any merely human artefact.  The team Object of Power hardly seemed to encompass the sword.  Like the Holy Grail, long lost since the Fall of Camelot and Arthur’s death, it was a legend given shape and form.

He looked over at one of his followers, a greedy young man with dark tastes and darker ambitions.  “Take it,” he ordered.  “Pick up the sword.”

A wiser man, even a Dark Sorcerer, would have known better to touch without looking for traps.  The young man’s face betrayed his greed as he reached for the sword and clamped his hand around the hilt, moving as if he suspected that someone would snatch it away before it was too late.  A blade of such power promised the entire world to its bearer, if the bearer was worthy.  The greedy young man – who had been fleeing from the city guardsmen when Maledict encountered him and brought him into his band of followers – was very far from worthy.  Scarcely had his hand touched the hilt when the sword blazed with angry power and his entire body burst into flame.  He barely even had time to scream.

Maledict watched dispassionately as the remains of his body – little more than ashes – crashed down to the floor.  The sword’s power levels had barely flickered, yet it had killed – and very effectively.  The dead man had been warded, just as Maledict himself was warded, but it hadn’t been enough to save his life.  Maledict had no doubt that the same thing would happen to him if he picked up the sword.

“Fool,” he muttered, as he shaped a thought with his mind.  Another of his followers would soon be with him.  He stepped away from the sword and noticed, without quite understanding, that there were no traces of dust or ashes on the blade itself.  It still glowed with power.

The door opened and an older man stepped into the room.  He’d been an enchanter before he’d decided that dark sorcery offered him the chance to wield magic beyond his wildest dreams.  Maledict had taught him how to expand his ability to channel magic in exchange for him serving the Dark Sorcerers and their cause.  Dawlish was never allowed to leave the base, even to join the more dangerous rituals.  He was just too valuable to lose.

“Master,” he said, with a bow.  His eyes didn’t meet Maledict’s; they were focused on the sword.  “You summoned me?”

Maledict nodded.  “You will study this Object of Power,” he said.  Enchanters produced Objects of Power, although few could claim to have produced anything as legendary as Excalibur.  “You will determine how we can use it for our cause.”

Dawlish looked worried, but then the man always looked worried.  “Master, the sword is beyond my comprehension,” he objected.  “I couldn’t even begin to study it.”

“Success will bring great rewards,” Maledict informed him.  He didn’t bother to point out that the man who learned how to control and tap their prize would have a source of great power under his control.  A Dark Sorcerer would have thought of it instinctively.  “Failure will bring its own rewards.”

His eyes, glowing red with power, met and held Dawlish’s pale brown eyes.  “You may call upon any of the resources on the base,” he said.  “If you need material from outside, we will fetch it for you.  All you have to do is crack the secrets of a legendry blade.”

He stepped back and motioned to the pile of dust and ashes.  “I advise you to be careful,” he added, coldly.  “The last person who touched the blade was unworthy and was killed instantly.  I do not want that to happen to you.”

Dawlish swallowed.  “Yes, Master,” he said.  “I will take every precaution.”

Maledict walked out of the chamber and gestured for it to seal itself behind him.  If something went badly wrong, there would be tons of stone between Excalibur any anyone else on the base.  He doubted that Dawlish would succeed quickly – the older an Object of Power, the more complicated it was – and if the sword did have a mind of its own, it might subvert Dawlish and escape.  And if Dawlish did succeed, he’d be tempted to turn the blade’s power against his master.

He walked down the long stone passageways, testing the wards as he moved.  He’d dispersed some of his awareness through the underground network and now he reached out with his mind, watching as the final captives were enslaved and put to work for their new masters.  It was a promising image of what the world would be like once they’d won, with magicians competing for supremacy while mundane humans served them at their beck and call.  And if he gained the power to control Excalibur, he could make that vision come true.

The stench of blood barely slowed him as he walked into the chamber.  A handful of slaves were cleaning the room, unable to pay any attention to the Knight hanging from the cross.  Maledict barked a command and the slaves fled, terrified for their lives. He closed the door and peered up at Sir Robin.  Even stunned, with his mind on the verge of embracing madness, the Knight was a charismatic figure, a rallying point around which opposition to the Dark Sorcerers could form.  And now he was Maledict’s captive.

He reached out and gently touched Sir Robin’s forehead, allowing his Sight to probe the Knight’s defences.  The armour provided protection against curses and control spells, a network of defences that would render it impossible to reprogram his mind.  It would be easy to kill him – like all finely-tuned spells, they could be overwhelmed with enough power – and yet that would be a waste.  Sir Robin was far more than just another Knight of the Round Table.  He was the husband of Lady Tiffany and the former wielder of Excalibur.  How could his capture be turned to best advantage?

Thoughts spun through Maledict’s head as he probed the defences.  Unravelling them all would be a complex task, even for his most skilled followers.  It would take weeks, at least, before they could reprogram Robin at will.  And if they could understand how the spells had been worked into the armour, they’d be able to duplicate them and arm his forces with similar spells.  Merlin might have created the first set of spells, but the later sets of armour had been created by enchanters in Camelot.  It should be possible to duplicate the spells.

Sir Robin’s eyes shot open.  Maledict saw him recoil and smiled, showing the remains of his teeth.  The Knight of the Round Table’s eyes filled with hated and rage and he struggled to break through the silver bands holding his arms to the cross, but it was futile.  Maledict had designed them to be impossible to escape, even for an Elf.  A merely mortal human, even one at the peak of his physical condition, would find escape beyond his ability.  He chuckled and watched as the Knight worked his jaws, preparing to spit.  The spittle fizzled harmlessly against his wards.

“I trust that you are comfortable, Sir Robin,” he said.  His voice no longer sounded human, not now that wild magic had wrecked havoc on his internal organs.  He sounded like a man who had smoked tobacco for years, every day.  “Welcome to our lair.  Would you care for some refreshment?”

Sir Robin glared at him, his gaze unbroken by fear.  It would have been good to hear him beg for mercy, but the Knights of the Round Table were renowned for being fearless.  Most of the legends surrounding them barely touched on the reality.

“I will accept nothing from you,” he rasped, finally.  “Don’t you know what you are doing?”

“I am taking over the world,” Maledict said.  It would be good to gloat to a Knight’s face, even if – or because - the Knight was a helpless prisoner.  “The Duke thinks that he is using me, but I am using him.  He will be surprised when I show him the horrors I will show you.  And then the world will be mine, an endless time of death and blood and slaughter, with the boundaries of magic pushed back and…”

“You’ll be destroyed by your own powers a long time before you take over the world,” Sir Robin pointed out.  He peered at Maledict, somehow meeting his glowing eyes without fear.  “You don’t even look human any more.  Your power is burning you up from the inside.  The time you have on this world is nearly over and then…”

Maledict slapped him, allowing his anger to take physical form.  “You know nothing,” he thundered.  “By the time we are finished with you, you will be our puppet!  You will go back to Camelot and rape your wife to death, for us!  You will take Excalibur and kill all of your friends, for us!  You will open up the city’s gates and deliver it to us!  You will be the greatest traitor in the history of the Empire!”

Sir Robin snorted.  “If you could crack my armour,” he pointed out, “you would have done it by now.”

“It may take a few days to crack through and expose your mind, but we have the time,” Maledict sneered.  “And then you will be ours.”

He clapped his hands and three of the slaves arrived, carrying clothes and a hot bowl of water.  “Prepare him in the chamber of torture,” he ordered.  “Do not release him, if only for a second.  Take him down there and prepare him for agony beyond imagination!”

“Oh very droll,” Sir Robin commented.  “Did it take you all day to think of those lines?”

Maledict caught his temper before he could blow the Knight into a billion tiny pieces and scatter them over the ruined city.  “Laugh all you want to laugh,” he said, coldly.  “I will laugh myself when I watch you killing your wife!”

With that, he gestured for the slaves to depart, calmly storing up his hatred and anger.  In time, he would have the last laugh – and the entire world on its knees.

Chapter Thirty

Tiffany sat at the back of the House of Commons – a right granted to those on the Privy Council, even though she was the Lady of Shallot – and watched the farce proceed to its inevitable end.  Thomas Cromwell, no longer the Lord Mayor of London, was replaced by Lord Randolph.  The factory-owner, with a string of complaints against him longer than Tiffany’s arm, took his place as Speaker, delivering a speech that was sure to grate on the ears of the Reform Party.  Lord Randolph had never made any secret of his dislike for Reform – after all, he was quite happy where he was – and now he was Speaker, the Reform Party would find that they had been pushed to one side.

She rubbed her eyes, feeling nothing, apart from a sense of quiet disgust.  Robin was missing in action, presumed a prisoner – or dead.  Tiffany felt numb every time she considered the possibilities; Robin’s body might never be found, or he would be returned a soulless automaton.  Or worse…she knew she should have rallied her supporters and attempted to challenge the new Speaker, but she hadn’t been able to muster the energy.  Robin had only been her husband for a week before he’d been taken from her…missing, perhaps a prisoner, perhaps dead.  Her ring was still warm…or was she imagining it?  The uncertainty gnawed at her far worse than certain knowledge could have done.

Lord Randolph’s long speech was finally coming to an end.  The Conservative MPs and those who wanted to toady up to the new Speaker cheered loudly, even though they’d heard a speech that could hardly have been called reassuring.  It might as well have been written by one of the Dukes.  The Reform MPs muttered darkly to one another, clearly plotting trouble.  Lord Randolph would find it hard to control the House of Commons, but the Conservatives could play on that.  The next election would be dominated by charges that the Reform MPs had stalled every proposal for reform.  Who would be interested in the truth when there was so much mud to throw?

No one tried to stop her, or to speak with her, as she stood up and walked out of the House of Commons.  She’d watched every kind of political backstabbing imaginable, back when Merlin had appointed her First Councillor, yet there had been limits.  Merlin’s very presence had imposed limits, forcing the MPs to remember that they were there to do a job, not become a power base in their own right.  Now…the MPs were finally starting to realise that they had considerable power and influence.  And the Speaker would be well-placed to ensure that that power and influence was directed towards the forces of reaction.

She stopped as a messenger appeared in front of her, his face unreadable.  He passed her a parchment and vanished again before she had a chance to open it and read it, just in case she decided to blame him for the message.  Tiffany read it slowly, and then cursed aloud.  The House of Lords were summoning her to an urgent session.  It couldn’t be good news.  Now that Lord Randolph was Speaker of the House of Commons, and the House of Magus was still fighting over who would be the next High Magus, the Conservatives would be dominant.  For all she knew, they wanted to remove her at once…but then, there was no precedent for removing a First Councillor.  Perhaps they’d finally worked up the nerve to create a precedent…

The House of Lords had never looked foreboding to her before, but this time she felt almost as if she was walking back into Merlin’s presence.  Someone had been busy, organising guards both mundane and magical.  Her spine tingled as she felt the presence of something very old and powerful, anchored to the House of Lords and protecting it from all harm.  Merlin had always forbidden summoning creatures from the Darkness in Camelot – and no one would have dared try, not with Merlin sitting at the heart of the city – but Merlin was gone.  The House of Lords, aware that they were prime targets for the Dark Sorcerers, had summoned a nasty presence and bound it in their defence.  In her heart, Tiffany couldn’t blame them.  The Dark Sorcerers were no respecters of rank or station.

Two guards, both clearly nervous, greeted her as soon as she entered the building.  Calmly, but firmly, they made it clear that they had been ordered to escort her into the chamber.  Tiffany knew that she should be angry, yet the numbness gripping her body made it hard to care about the explicit insult to her honour.  Did the House of Lords expect that she would produce a wand and start transforming them all into frogs?  But then, when Merlin had been her backer, she’d had that power.  Now…she was almost powerless, even though she was a trained magician.

She smiled suddenly and walked faster, pulling herself upright.  The guards found themselves becoming an escort of honour, rather than an insult to her person.  She caught a glimpse of their faces and smiled again, knowing that they’d been outmanoeuvred without ever understanding the rules of the game.  Their patron would certainly understand – and be angry.  They’d be lucky if they were still guardsmen within the day.  

The great stone doors opened as she approached, allowing her to walk right into the House of Lords.  As she had expected, the chamber was packed, with Duke Blackrock the only missing person.  The heirs of those who had died at the Summer Palace had been allowed to take their seats, ensuring that there was a full house.  Duke Valditch stood in the centre of the chamber, clearly serving as the House’s representative and Speaker.  Her lips twitched as he caught her eye, his eyes narrowing.  He’d probably hoped that she’d roll over and die for him.  Instead, she was going to give him a fight…if only she could work up the determination.  She hadn’t felt so weak when Merlin had vanished, leaving her trapped at the centre of a crumbling empire.

She dismissed her guards with a wave of her hand – the guards obeyed, despite the glare from their master – and took her seat, below the great golden throne the House of Lords had prepared for Merlin.  He’d never sat in it, ever since it had been brought into the city, much to the House’s silent relief.  They’d been forced to bow the knee to Merlin, but not all of them had liked him, let alone trusted his legendary temper.  Merlin had been no respecter of rank and station either.  And, as an all-powerful immortal king, what he said went.

“I come, as you requested,” Tiffany said.  Her clear voice rang through the chamber.  “I stand before you.”

There was a long silence.  “Lady Tiffany of Shallot, this House has summoned you to answer for your conduct,” Duke Valditch said, finally.  He sounded strong and confident, yet Tiffany could hear the hints of uncertainty in his voice.  He’d probably had a script for the entire encounter, one that Tiffany had already disrupted.  “You have shamed yourself and brought shame upon your peers.  You have committed a crime against the dignity of the House of Lords.”

Tiffany kept her own face expressionless.  Technically, all noblemen were equals, although in reality the senior aristocrats generally ruled the roost with a rod of iron.  The Lady of Shallot was hardly a Knight, yet she wasn’t comparable to a Duke.  Only Merlin’s backing had made her their superior.  It looked as if her time had finally run out.  

The House of Lords had never been comfortable with the idea of commoners judging them.  They tended to be very quiet about Merlin’s right to judge them, but then anyone who objected too loudly was likely to spend the rest of his life croaking on a lily pad.  If a nobleman was forced to face justice, it was a justice delivered by his peers, unless Merlin stepped in and claimed the right to judge him himself.  Tiffany had hoped to prevent Duke Blackrock from facing the House of Lords – after all, none of them would be happy about convicting a Duke – and had hoped that Merlin would deal with it.  Instead…he’d gone, and the Duke had escaped.

No one had ever defined a crime that could be brought before the House of Lords.  In a very real sense, a crime against the House of Lords’ collective dignity – and the dignity of all aristocrats – was whatever the House of Lords said it was.  If found guilty, a convict could be stripped of all rank and station, or at the very least permanently excluded from the House of Lords – and the centre of power in the empire.  They could convict Tiffany, if they got the votes, for something as mundane as wearing a black dress on a Sunday.

“I have committed no crime,” Tiffany said, calmly.  She had a nasty suspicion that she knew where this was going, but she kept it off her face.  Let them try to force her out, if they dared.  Their actions would be exposed for all to see.  “What charges do you wish to bring against me?”

Duke Valditch didn’t hesitate.  “You chose to deploy most of the Empire’s military force to Tara,” he said.  “You opened a gap that the Dark Sorcerers exploited by attacking and nearly destroying an entire city.  You are not suited to be Lady of Shallot.”

So that was his game, Tiffany realised.  There was no precedent for unseating a First Councillor, but if they unseated the Lady of Shallot and passed the title onto Tiffany’s heirs – her cousins, as she had no children – she would have to resign as First Councillor.  It was a neat solution to the problem and it was – technically – legal.  If they found her incompetent, they’d have the power they needed to force her out of office.  And then the position of First Councillor would be up for grabs.  She had an idea she knew who considered himself the front runner for the post.

“As precedent states, we may move immediately to a vote,” Duke Valditch said.  “I call the question.”

“I object,” Tiffany said.  It was neat…and part of her didn’t want to fight, for losing would mean putting down her burden…but she wasn't going to make it that easy.  “As the accused, I have the right to spend a month mustering my supporters.”

Duke Valditch gave her a long icy look.  “The precedent of Lord Holmes would suggest otherwise,” he said.  His legal supporters must have been spending hours coming up with precedents from a thousand years of history, looking for the ones that best suited their needs.  “Lord Holmes was charged, tried and convicted within two days.”

Tiffany smiled.  Like all upper-class children, she’d had some of the more important precedents drummed into her head by her parents.  “Lord Holmes was not a Patriarch and it was unanimously decreed by the House of Lords that his trial should be held at once.  Do you wish to seek a vote on the issue?”

There was a long pause.  Tiffany watched Duke Valditch closely, gauging his support.  If he felt that most of the House of Lords would be behind him, he would probably risk it…but they’d be reluctant to open up a new can of worms.  Railroading Tiffany would create a precedent that could be used against them, later.  The smart course of action would be to insist on a month, allowing Tiffany time to prepare her defence.

“No,” Duke Valditch said, finally.  “However, as the issue at hand is so vital to the security of the empire, we must insist that you step down until the question is resolved.”

“Insist?”  Tiffany repeated.  She smiled, coldly.  “There is no precedent for any nobleman, whatever the charges, standing down until the trial and judgement.  Do you wish to call a vote on that, too?”

Duke Valditch looked as if he might be considering it, but the House of Lords would never support such a motion.  “Very well,” he said, finally.  “Lady Tiffany, it is my duty as Speaker of the House of Lords to inform you that you are called to face a tribunal of your peers, one month from now.  Should you be found guilty, you will be stripped of your aristocratic title and banished from the House of Lords.”

There was a rustle as a hundred voices started to talk at once, quietened by the wards in the chamber.  Not all of the aristocrats were behind the Duke, then.  Quite a few of them were making their displeasure very clear, even though the Duke was a powerful enemy.  Several other Dukes looked as if they would rather be anywhere else, even though the House of Lords was the new centre of the empire.  Tiffany was tempted to swing around and demand an instant trial, but that would have been impossible.  A month…a great deal could happen in a month.  

“I understand,” she said, calmly.  “I will receive the formal written charges from your office within the day.”

On that note, she turned and walked out of the chamber, daring them to follow her.

***
When Tiffany was upset, or just wanted a break from the pressures of her office, she walked down to Beneficence and into the library.  It was always a calming environment and Lady Aylia was an excellent sounding board, either for her troubles or her ideas.  She was working away at one of the desks when Tiffany ended, but she took one look at Tiffany’s face and gestured for one of the brownies to bring her visitor a cup of hot milk.

“Interesting,” she said, when Tiffany had finished explaining.  If she hadn’t been so numb, she would probably have been unable to think.  It felt like a betrayal of everything the Empire had once stood for, as if the rejection of Merlin’s chosen representative was a rejection of Merlin himself.  “Quite a clever political operation, really.  I wonder who else he has on his side.”

“Not all of the House of Lords, or he would have forced through a vote today and to hell with precedent,” Tiffany said.  She sipped her drink gratefully, looking up at the piles of books and the portrait of John Dee, one of the College’s masters, on the far wall.  Dee seemed to be smiling at a joke only he understood, for he’d been one of the few to unlock the inner secrets of alchemist magic.  There were rumours that his long-lost notes were hidden somewhere within the College, prompting students to search for them every year.  “But the timing is suspicious.”

“He laid the groundwork for it before the attack on Londinium,” a new voice said.  Tiffany started and almost spilled her milk.  “Almost as if he knew that it was going to happen.”

Tiffany turned around, one hand dropping to her wand.  A figure was seated at one of the desks, wearing sorcerer’s black.  He had an utterly unmemorable face, the kind of face that one could pass on the streets and forget completely a few seconds later.  It was a natural glamour, one that was very useful for the Tribunal.  They didn’t need magic to hide their presence.

“Sorcerer Black,” she said, standing up and performing a half-curtsy.  At least that explained why she hadn’t seen him when she entered.  The Tribunal’s master would have concealed himself using spells too subtle for her to detect, particularly when she wasn’t looking for them.  “I was hoping that we would get a chance to speak.”

Black nodded, bowing to her in return.  “I wished to discuss matters with you in privacy,” he said.  “The House of Magus is coming apart at the seams.  It will not be long before the magical battles between contestants for the position of High Magus spread out into Camelot itself.”

Tiffany rubbed her tired eyes.  “Another problem?”  She enquired, archly.  “Can’t they see that we’re at war?”

“Magicians – sorcerers in particularly – are known to be power-hungry,” Sorcerer Black reminded her.  “They will keep fighting until the new pecking order is established.  And then they will start preparing for the day that the pecking order changes again.”

Tiffany nodded, slowly.  The last High Magus had been a dangerous man, even his friends and allies had been a little nervous around him.  It wasn’t a position where bluff and bluster could prevent challengers from destroying the incumbent; the only way to keep the House of Magus in line was by being the strongest magician and being willing to use the magic if challenged.  And unless a magician was clearly stronger, other magicians wouldn't follow him.

“I have a proposal,” Sorcerer Black said.  “I would like to throw my own hat into the ring.”

Tiffany frowned, thinking hard.  The Tribunal already had too much power, even under Merlin.  It had authority to go anywhere and do anything in the quest to destroy dark magic – and yet it had failed; an entire band of Dark Sorcerers had formed, despite the Tribunal.  People feared and hated the Tribunal, but once word of its failure got out…

She looked up.  The master of the Tribunal would have to be a powerful sorcerer, yet he’d been kept in the shadows by Merlin.  For him to come out into the open…the advantages were obvious, but so were the dangers.  It would unite the House of Magus, and yet…it would create a new centre of power in Camelot.  How long could an organisation that worked in the shadows remain resistant to temptation?

And Sorcerer Black had sought her permission first.  That had to mean something.

“A good idea,” she said, finally.  “Are you sure that you can win?”

“Of course,” Sorcerer Black assured her.  “I never lose.”

Tiffany wondered just how true that was, but then…he was the master of the Tribunal, and he had duelled with Dark Sorcerers in the past.  He could make himself the High Magus…and come out of the shadows.  And that would have consequences even Merlin would have hesitated to predict.

“Then make it so,” she ordered, finally.  She would have to gamble, again.  “Good luck.”

“Sorcerers make their own luck,” Sorcerer Black said.

And he vanished in a flash of green light.

Chapter Thirty-One

“Are you awake now?”  A cruel voice asked.  “We need to talk, you and I…”

Robin kept his eyes closed.  He’d recovered awareness only a few minutes ago and had wanted to listen, quietly testing his bonds as much as possible.  It hardly mattered.  Green fire flared through his closed eyelids and he screamed in pain, his eyes jerking open as the curse burned through his soul.  A leering face was peering down at him, eyes glowing with the reddened madness of dark sorcery.  It burst into cackling laughter as Robin met his eyes, laughter that betrayed more than a hint of madness.

He looked away from the Dark Sorcerer and tried to scope out the room.  It was a dark chamber, illuminated only by burning torches set into the stone walls.  He wondered why they didn’t use magic to illuminate the room – they couldn’t be afraid of detection, not in the middle of a city wreaked by a demon – but it hardly mattered.  It looked as if they were finally going to interrogate him.

It was impossible to tell how long he’d been out of it.  An hour, or a day, or a week…or far longer?  Magic had been used to preserve people in ice for years, saving them until they were finally defrosted; the Dark Sorcerers might have been able to keep him out of it for years.  Only the thought that his knowledge, the only thing they might have wanted from his mind, reassured him.  Besides, they hadn’t had time to remove his armour.  They wouldn't have left it on him if they’d been able to remove it.  The protections spelled into the metal would still hold.

Reluctantly, he looked back at the Dark Sorcerer.  The man was clearly heading towards the later stages of dark arts dementia, with his skin starting to show signs of excessive use of magic.  His hands kept fidgeting like crazy, with tiny blew sparks flickering in and out of existence.  Strange shapes seemed to move under his robes, as if his body was starting to mutate.  It struck Robin, as he patiently waited for the next torment, that there really was little difference between someone touched by wild magic and a Dark Sorcerer, except that the Dark Sorcerers had made the decision to accept the price of power.

“You know how the sword works,” the Dark Sorcerer said.  His hands seemed to fidget faster.  “Tell me how it works or I’ll hurt you.”

Robin snorted.  “You’ll never be able to unlock the secrets of the sword,” he said, dryly.  A thought struck him.  “Or perhaps you could.  All you have to do is pick up the sword…”

The Dark Sorcerer lifted his wand and muttered a curse.  Green fire flared again and Robin screamed, feeling as if every inch of his body was on fire.  The pain seemed endless, just for a second, and then it was gone, leaving him weak and drained.  He’d felt pain before, yet this…was something new and terrifying.  A Dark Sorcerer had little compunction about inflicting pain on a captive prisoner, but this one was clearly willing to use the darkest of charms, spells that demanded evil intentions from their user.  And if he was trying to unlock the secrets bound into the sword, the chances were good that he was desperate by now.

“Do you think I’m stupid?”  The Dark Sorcerer hissed.  His voice no longer sounded human.  When he opened his mouth, Robin saw a sickening mass of bleeding gums, with only a handful of teeth.  Blood trickled down his chin as he spoke.  “The damned blade killed one of my allies.”

“It can only be wielded by the worthy,” Robin said, mockingly.  If there was no hope of escape, perhaps he could provoke them into killing him before they managed to remove his armour, or crack his will to resist with torture.  “You’re not worthy.”

The Dark Sorcerer, his face contorted with an inhuman fury, lifted his wand again.  This time, bright blue fire glowed at the tip, just before he pointed the wand at Robin’s chest and pushed it into the armour place.  There was a bright blue glow, and then Robin felt a strange sensation of warmth running through his body.  The armour had to be dampening the effects of the curse.  There was no time to reflect on the armour as the Dark Sorcerer slowly pulled the tip of his wand up to Robin’s neck and the heat suddenly became agonising as it touched bare flesh.  Robin knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that the fire was about to burn through his throat…and then the pain faded and was gone.

There was a flash of light and the Dark Sorcerer vanished.  Robin blinked in confusion and looked up to see two more robed figures – one definitely female – stepping into the chamber.  The leader was peering down at the ground and Robin followed his gaze, puzzled.  A small snail sat on the ground, its head retreating into its shell.  Before Robin could say anything, the newcomer brought his boot down on the snail and crushed it into a bloody pulp.

Robin felt bile rising in his throat and fought down the urge to vomit.  The newcomer had transfigured and then killed the torturer.  It didn’t make sense to his confused mind, which was recoiling in horror.  There were very old nightmares about how magic could be used to change and then harm a person – and the newcomer had tapped into them all.  Robin knew, as he looked back up at him, that he was looking at the leader of the Dark Sorcerers.

He was a tall man, his skin parched and weakened by exposure to dark magic.  His eyes glowed with the same eerie redness of the torturer, but he appeared to be far more in control of himself.  The dark robes hid everything else from Robin’s sight, yet he moved normally, unlike some of the more warped creatures of dark magic.  A long beard that reminded Robin of Merlin hung down from his chin, tainted white by exposure to magic.

“Sir Robin,” he said.  His voice was cracked, but far more human.  “You are going to tell us everything we want to know.”

“No,” Robin said, flatly.  It made sense.  Before they warped his mind, they’d want to know everything he knew about Camelot and the Knights of the Round Table.  And as Tiffany’s husband, he’d picked up far more about politics and the political situation than any ordinary Knight.  They’d find him a rich resource of information, if they managed to break him.  “I am not going to tell you anything.”

The Dark Sorcerer seemed to find that funny.  “I caught another Knight of the Round Table and brought him here,” he said, dryly.  “He swore before the August Personage and all of His Saints that he would not say a single word.  And then we burned through his defences and took everything he knew for ourselves.”

His smile widened.  “And then we put him on the altar and sacrificed him for power,” he added.  “Ah…but you have a much more interesting fate to look forward to…”

Robin sucked in a breath.  “You can’t remove my armour, or you would have done it already,” he said.  There was no way to know if the sorcerer was telling the truth about capturing and breaking another Knight.  It was true that several Knights died every year, but as far as he could recall, all of them had been accounted for.  But then, with enough magic, they could probably create a fictitious account of a death that would pass casual examination.  “You can’t break me.”

“I am the Sorcerer Maledict,” the sorcerer said.  “I can break you.  And then you will be ours.”

Before Robin could spit defiance at him, he started to twist his wand.  The altar Robin had been tied to shifted, pushing him up into an upright position.  The chains on his wrists started to head upwards, pulling him to his feet.  A noose fell from above and wrapped around his neck, forcing him to stand on his toes.  It was hard to breathe, even standing upright.  A fall would condemn him to death by slow suffocation.  Maledict walked around, examining the ties, before standing back and treating Robin to a nasty smile.  The prisoner was ready to be interrogated.

Robin focused on Maledict, trying to avoid thinking about the coming ordeal.  The Dark Sorcerer’s name was unfamiliar, but that was hardly surprising.  Sorcerers always took new names when they boosted their magic, knowing that names could be used to target magic against them.  The Dark Sorcerer was clearly insane, yet there was a hard edge of rationality guiding him.  Robin cursed under his breath.  A completely insane Dark Sorcerer could do a hell of a lot of damage, but he could be stopped.  One insane enough to develop his power, yet sane enough to play the game carefully, would be much harder to handle.  And he’d attacked an entire city, and escaped.  For all Robin knew, his forces had won the battle and occupied the city, treating its citizens to a lesson in the true power of dark sorcery.

Maledict lifted his wand and smiled.  “You will betray your wife and your entire empire,” he said.  “I will know everything you know…”

The pain began a second later.  Fire flared though Robin’s body, leaving him screaming and struggling to stand upright.  It crossed his mind that he could simply throw himself to the side and choke to death, but suicide was a mortal sin, one that would condemn him to the fires of Hell forever.  Maledict altered his wand slightly and the pain intensified, before dropping down to a presence that seemed to grate at the back of Robin’s mind.

“I imagine that they don’t teach you much about the darkest of spells,” Maledict said, almost conversationally.  “You may not realise what is burning.  I’m setting fire to your very soul.  Eventually, if I keep burning away at you, you will become a soulless creature, wandering the night desperately trying to find a new soul.  All traces of what makes you the person you are will be gone.”

Robin shivered.  There were stories about the soulless, whispered down through the ages.  The soulless gave their souls to the demons from Hell, or somehow abandoned them…and were cursed to wander the mortal world for the rest of time.  There were legends that said that the zombie plague stole souls as it passed from host to host, yet the truth had been left undiscovered, almost as if the Great Colleges were scared to discover the answer.  A soulless person could perform acts that would make a Dark Sorcerer blanch and never know – or care – that it was wrong.

“You can’t do that,” he gasped.  His mind knew that his body was unhurt, but his body refused to believe it.  The armour wasn't providing enough protection.  Or perhaps it would be worse without the armour.  “God creates souls…”

Maledict waved his wand and another burst of fire spread through Robin’s body.  “One day we shall have enough power to challenge God,” he said, as he cast a second charm.  It was normally used for healing, but now all it did was bring him pain.  “And then we will see about reshaping the universe to our needs.”

He stepped forward, until his bright red eyes were burning into Robin’s eyes.  “Do you want to talk yet?”

Robin had to gasp for breath before he replied.  “Go…damn…yourself,” he hissed.  He tried to take refuge in memories of Tiffany, but his body’s aches and pains, however phantom they were, kept drawing him back to himself.  “I won’t talk…”

The pain seemed to last for hours.  Robin found himself driven right to the edge of his endurance.  The Dark Sorcerer was a master at using warped healing charms to manipulate a body’s nerves, leaving Robin screaming his agony until his throat felt raw.  He almost collapsed five times, only to be caught by magic before he could fall and choke to death.  The pain just kept growing worse and worse; there were other Dark Sorcerers in the room now, casting their own charms towards his helpless body.

And then the pain stopped.  He opened his eyes, feeling sweat cascading off his forehead and down onto the ground.  Maledict was standing in front of him, holding up one scaled hand.  It seemed to have been warped by dark magic, because there was a gnarled claw right in front of him.  Or perhaps he was seeing things.  His tormenters had played with his eyes as well as every other exposed part of his body.  If only he’d been wearing a full set of armour.

Maledict pressed his hand into Robin’s head and smiled, muttering an incantation under his breath.  Robin felt nothing for a long moment, and then he felt Maledict’s presence in his mind.  The sense of violation was so strong that he screamed in helpless rage and lashed out inside his mind.  He had the satisfaction of feeling the presence retreat, just for a second, before it came back with far greater force.  Maledict was boring his way right into Robin’s mind, hacking through early memories to pull out the latest thoughts.  Robin screamed inside his head…

An image drifted to the top of his mind.  Tiffany, naked and lovely, sitting above him as they prepared for their wedding night.  Her small firm breasts hung down, drawing his eyes helplessly towards them as she planted her hands on his chest and impaled herself on him.  He felt a flash of malicious amusement that came from outside him and recoiled in horror.  Maledict was studying his memories of their wedding night casually, breaking every taboo surrounding the use of mental magic.  Robin felt a flash of pure hatred and fought back savagely, trying to drive Maledict out of his mind…

Someone was beating him, thrashing him with a leather belt.  His father had come home from the factory, drunk already and bent on taking it out on his son.  The beating only grew more savage as the boy’s mother tried to intervene, only to be shoved away by her drunken husband.  Eventually, the boy was allowed to run off and hide in a corner of the hovel, listening to the terrifying sounds from his mother.  The adult Robin recoiled from the memory…

It was Maledict’s memory, he realised suddenly, a memory he’d somehow plucked out of the sorcerer’s mind.  He felt Maledict’s sudden burst of anger as he realised that Robin had seen some of his memories, and then he was buffeted by another burst of pain.  This time, he hung on grimly and was rewarded by a second glimpse into Maledict’s memories.  A young man, already learning sorcery from a teacher with dark motives, used the magic to kill his father, literally turning him inside out.  The boy had died that day and the Dark Sorcerer had been born.

Maledict’s mind crept through his, trying to pin Robin down.  Robin fought back as best as he could, trying to distract the sorcerer, but nothing seemed to work.  Cold fingers probed through his mind and everything went dim…

A hand slapped against his face and he realised that his mind had blurred out completely.  He felt tired and helpless, yet he hadn’t broken, not yet.  And yet, Maledict could simply keep torturing him, day after day until he finally cracked.  Cold despair whispered up from the depths of his mind. Surely Tiffany wouldn't expect him to hold out against torture, would she…?  Of course she would, he told himself, and forced himself to stand straighter.  He’d find the strength to resist somehow…

Maledict turned and stormed out of the chamber, leaving Robin alone to catch his breath.  He was mildly surprised that they hadn’t simply continued the torture, but if they’d kept up the pressure his mind might have cracked completely.  And it wasn't as if the torture had stopped completely.  They’d left him standing upright, knowing that it wouldn’t be long before he cracked.  Robin fought to concentrate, despite the headache burning though his mind.  He had to get out of the chamber before they came back.  And yet it seemed impossible.

He looked up, slowly, and a mad thought began to gestate in his mind.  It might well be suicide, but at least it wouldn’t be intentional suicide.  They’d chained him to the roof, yet the chains didn’t look very strong.  One good pull might bring them down and then he’d be free to move.  And if he failed, he’d choke himself to death.  

Carefully, he tested the robe wrapped around his neck.  It wasn't very strong, but it would be enough to strangle him if he fell over.  Before he could think better of it, he grasped the chains in both hands and swung his legs up, yanking down as hard as he could.  For an agonising second, it looked as if his gamble had failed…and then the hook in the roof broke free and crashed down, nearly striking his head.  Robin crashed to the ground, hoping – praying – that no one had heard the noise.  It was the work of a few moments to free his hands.  They’d been so confident in the prison cell that they hadn’t even tried to remove the small kit from his armour, including a lockpick.  

Robin pulled himself to his feet quickly and headed towards the door.  It wouldn’t be long before the sorcerers returned, and by then he had to be a long way away from the cell, far enough so that magic couldn’t track him.  And that wouldn’t be easy, but at least he was free.  After what he’d already done, escape should be easy.  He checked his armour, scowled at the scars, and kept moving.

He was nearly at the door when it sprung open in front of him.

Chapter Thirty-Two

The Dark Sorcerer looked almost as surprised as Robin.  He was young, clearly too confident in the powers and abilities of his master, not experienced enough to realise that they had limits.  Robin threw himself at him before he had a chance to react and bring up his wards, grabbing and twisting his neck as hard as he could.  The sorcerer’s neck broke with an audible crack and his body collapsed to the ground.

Robin followed it down, searching the sorcerer’s robes quickly and efficiently for anything that might be useful.  His wand had snapped when his body had hit the ground, but Robin was careful not to touch it anyway, just in case.  Wizards learned to protect their wands from a very early age and sorcerers tended to follow the same rule.  There was a strange gem that his fingers skittered over when he tried to touch it, a handful of gold pieces and a scrap of paper covered in strange symbols.  Robin checked the gold pieces and pocketed them, followed by the paper.  It might be useful when he got back to Camelot.

Standing up, he dragged the sorcerer’s body out of sight and carefully slipped out into the corridor.  A draft of cold air struck him in the face, carrying a smell that Robin was glad he couldn’t identify.  Dark Sorcerers, already living on the brink of permanent madness, cared little for their surroundings.  They could have brought in slaves to clean the underground chambers, yet they couldn’t even muster the energy to do that!  Carefully, he slipped down the corridor, trusting to luck that he wouldn't encounter any wards or supernatural guards.  The Dark Sorcerers had had to be confident in their security, or they'd never have left him aware and alone.

He listened carefully as he slipped from shadow to shadow, but heard nothing. The Dark Sorcerers seemed to be sleeping, or perhaps most of them had set out on another attack.  The thought of a second burning city spurred him onwards, yet he had no idea which way to go.  All the tricks he’d learned at the Garrison for finding his way didn’t seem to work.  Thoughtfully, he closed his eyes, instantly feeling the sword’s presence in his mind.  Excalibur wasn't far away, but it was calling to him.  Somehow, he found that he knew the way to go.

The corridors grew darker and danker as he kept walking.  From time to time, he heard strange noises, screams torn from inhuman throats.  He heard rustling in the walls that suggested the presence of rats, but rats twisted and mutated by the wild magic running through the ruined city.  Once, he saw a shadow walking towards him and braced himself for a fight, only to see the shadow walking right through him and onwards down the corridor.  The ghosts of the destroyed city, trapped by the darkest of magic, were unable to find rest.  Robin doubted that the Dark Sorcerers cared about their presence in their lair.

He stopped as he saw light spilling from a room ahead and listened carefully, hearing only a rustling sound that sounded as if someone was reading a book.  Robin slipped forward and peered into the room, almost exhaling in relief when he realised that the room’s single occupant had his back to him.   He was reading his way through a pile of books, each one showing signs of age, making notes on a sheet of paper as he worked.  Robin hesitated, unsure of who or what he was, before he saw the dark robe that had been carelessly discarded over a chair.  The Dark Sorcerer, perhaps one of the ones he’d seen before he’d been captured, seemed lost in his work.

Robin would have preferred to take him prisoner and interrogate him, but he knew that it was impossible.  A sorcerer knew all kinds of protections, including some that could be triggered by thought alone.  Capturing a Dark Sorcerer was never an easy business and always required heavy support from combat magicians.  Alone, Robin couldn't do anything other than kill him, or at the very least knock him out.  And knocking him out meant that he would recover, perhaps sooner than expected because of his power.  He slipped forward, moving as quietly as he could, and slammed his fist down on his head.  He gasped and slumped, his lips twitching as if they were trying to form words.  Robin studied him for a moment and then punched him right in the throat.  He gagged and collapsed on the floor, dead.

Leaving his body to lie there, Robin picked up the book he’d been reading and frowned as he recognised it.  The Necronomicon; a compilation of spells to summon demons and creatures from the Great Beyond that had been compiled by the mad Abdul Alhazred from the Fertile Crescent.  The book was banned and only a handful of copies were supposed to exist, all under lock and key.  He had no idea how the Dark Sorcerers had obtained a copy; after all, people who kept the book without taking through precautions often came to bad ends.  The Necronomicon had long been known as a cursed volume.  It’s author had vanished mysteriously two years after he had completed the book and no one, not even Merlin, cared to guess what had happened to him.

He checked the other volumes on the shelves and almost swore aloud.  Some of the books were even darker than the Necronomicon, including the Book of Pacts that had been written and signed in the sorcerer’s own blood.  Dark Sorcerers often made pacts with demons and other diabolical creatures, tapping their power in exchange for sacrifices and souls.  There was enough evidence in front of him to ensure that all of the Dark Sorcerers would be executed, if it was ever placed in front of the Tribunal.  One volume, written in a long-lost tongue, carried an automatic death sentence for anyone caught possessing it.  Merlin had long banned the creation of artificial life and the book, the sole relic to survive the destruction of an illegal ring of sorcerers, explained exactly how to do it.

Robin glanced around, looking for a match, before he thought better of it.  The books of dark magic often carried their own protections, ranging from simple charms and glamour spells that allowed them to hide among more innocent books, to hexes and curses that would drastically shorten the life expectancy of anyone who tried to destroy them.  It was possible, of course, but it required careful warding and Robin didn’t have the skill to even begin.  He’d have to come back with reinforcements and destroy the volumes.

He put the final volume down on the table and dragged the dead body into the next room, searching it after he put it down.  There was little useful, apart from a silver knife carved with strange runes.  It didn’t feel evil, but that hardly mattered, not when magic was defined as much by intention as anything else.  He pocketed the knife – feeling a little less vulnerable as he did so – and glanced into a corner.  The objects on the table caught his eye and he headed over to them, peering down at a set of basins.  They were filled with human blood.

Robin swore, aloud.  Blood magic wasn't exactly illegal – in many ways, it was the easiest form of magic – but it was definitely frowned upon, and rarely discussed by the Great Colleges.  A sample of a person’s blood, if that person wasn't warded properly, could be used to curse them, or control them, from a distance.  And if someone fell under such a spell, it could be very hard to break it.  They’d never know that anything was wrong, even as their minds were altered into servitude.  The human mind was extremely good at thinking of ways to justify itself.

There was no way to know who the blood belonged to, or what the Dark Sorcerers had had in mind.  Impulsively, Robin picked up a small jug of water and poured it into the blood, before leaving the room as quickly as possible.  Blood magic could be disrupted by running water, giving the victims a chance to free themselves, or ask for help.  He felt Excalibur in his head, calling him onwards, and he kept moving.  There was no more time to waste.

He hid in the shadows as a pair of Dark Sorcerers walked past him, chatting in a language Robin didn’t recognise.  They seemed unaware of his presence and he considered leaping out and attacking them, before deciding that it would be futile and result in his immediate death or recapture.  The corridors seemed to becoming lighter, even though he could have sworn that he was heading down, deeper into the earth.  No amount of study could tell where the light was coming from.  It was simply there.

A voice was pleading up ahead of him.  Robin hesitated, and then headed up towards the voice, still keeping to the shadows.  He peered into a darkened room and saw a naked man lying on a stone altar, frantically pleading for his life.  A pair of Dark Sorcerers could be heard chanting incantations over his body, while glancing towards the figures chained to the wall.  Robin could guess what was happening.  The father would be warped by dark magic and then turned on his family, an act that would please the devil and result in extra power for the Dark Sorcerers.  He wanted to step in and save them all, yet he knew that it was impossible.  Two alert Dark Sorcerers would be able to kill him before he could kill them.

He slipped back down the corridor, heading towards Excalibur.  The sword’s presence was growing stronger, almost overwhelming him.  It came as a surprise when he walked right into an open chamber and saw the sword lying on a stone altar.  Bowls of blood, like the one he had contaminated, surrounded the hilt, allowing a Dark Sorcerer to pour warm blood over the blade while chanting aloud, a rhyming spell that reminded Robin of an enchanter’s safeguard spell.  It struck him that that was exactly what it was; given enough time, the Dark Sorcerers would be able to break Excalibur down into its component spells, and then rewrite it to suit their requirements.  They might even be able to duplicate the sword.

And that could not be allowed.  Legend claimed that there were three swords from the past, one given to King Arthur, a second tainted by his son and a third lost forever in Avalon.  A tainted Excalibur would be a nightmare, even if the Dark Sorcerers couldn’t wield it properly.  He stepped forward, but this time he was too late.  The Dark Sorcerer made a motion with one hand and Robin froze, his body locked rigid.

“All right,” the Dark Sorcerer said.  He sounded confident and he had reason to be, Robin grudgingly conceded.  No amount of struggle seemed to unlock the paralysis gripping his body.  He couldn’t even blink!  “How did you use this sword?”

Robin wouldn’t have answered, even if he could have.  One Dark Sorcerer had clearly been unable to unlock the secrets of Excalibur; a second might have more luck, perhaps if he used Robin’s blood to convince the sword that it was in a worthy pair of hands.  He groaned inwardly in silent frustration, his mind shaping mental commands to his armour, commands that seemed to have no effect at all.  His armour was simply too badly damaged to provide much help, let alone protection.

“And you’re out of your cell,” the Dark Sorcerer said.  He touched Robin’s forehead and Robin felt cold icy fingers poking their way into his mind.  His defences had been weakened, perhaps lost for good.  He’d gambled and failed and now the whole world would pay the price.  “How did you get out of your cell?”

Perhaps desperation helped, for Robin cried silently out to Excalibur.  The link that had forged the moment he first drew the sword flared to life and Excalibur flew off the table, right through the stunned sorcerer and into Robin’s hand.  Instantly, the paralysis was broken.  He swept Excalibur around and sliced the sorcerer’s head off before he could summon help, or launch a spell.  New strength seemed to flow into his body and he found himself laughing aloud, just before his senses suddenly expanded rapidly.  He could feel the Dark Sorcerers in their nest, sense their sudden rage as they discovered that he was not in his cell and had escaped.  They’d be coming for him now…

Quickly, he swept the glowing blade through the various piles of magical tools and shattered them, before he started to run.  The corridor seemed to be shimmering with new and deadly magic now, but Excalibur cut through them like a knife through butter.  They’d know where he was, simply by sensing the destruction of their spells, yet they would have real problems tracking him.  Or so he hoped.  Excalibur or no Excalibur, he was in no state for a fight.  He found a way up towards the surface, a ruined staircase that looked as if its destruction preceded the lost of the city, and ran for his life.  Behind him, he could hear screams of outrage from the sorcerers.  They wanted his head, preferably not attached to his body,.

Cold air, mercifully clear, struck him in the face as he reached the surface and ran out into the open air.  The sight of the city stopped him in his tracks.  Dark magic shimmered everywhere, while the signs of the demon’s passage were everywhere, to those with the right eyes.  It had torn down entire city blocks and mansions as if it had existed purely to destroy.  Parts of the remaining city looked melted, as if they had been exposed to tremendous heat.  There was no sign of life, apart from the howls from underground.

Excalibur screamed a warning into his head.  Something was materialising, only a few meters from his location.  Against his better judgment, Robin turned and peered towards the sight, yet nothing could be seen.  He could hear it though, grunting and groaning that had come from no human throat, an evil sound that sent chills down his body.  Excalibur allowed him to boost his Sight, yet the creature was still barely visible, a shimmering haze that moved across the ground.  He could hear its footsteps, chillingly heavy, as it paced around, trying to pick up the scent.  The Dark Sorcerers had summoned a Hellhound out of Hell!

Robin slipped away as quietly as possible, knowing that it would be futile.  It was; two minutes later, he heard the sound of the Hellhound bounding towards him.  Even though it was effectively invisible, he could still see the signs of its passage, and hear the deep heavy breathing.  The heat from its passage warmed the air, yet brought an unpleasant stench of fire and brimstone.  Robin jumped, his legs propelled by the sword, as the Hellhound opened its mouth and breathed a wall of hellfire towards him.  If it had touched him…but it hadn’t…it had missed.

Cursing, Robin turned and lashed out with Excalibur.  There was a terrifying roar as the glowing blade struck something, but the beast refused to be deterred.  It struck back with a paw that seemed to be made of solid steel, sending Robin flying head over heels and right into a wall.  A second blow sent him flying through the air, crashing down on a pile of rubble.  If he hadn’t been holding Excalibur, he would have been killed outright.  As it was, he had a chance to look for cover.

There was nothing, apart from a small coppice of dead trees several hundred meters away.  None of the buildings would suffice, even if he managed to find one he could barricade against the monster.  He might as well invite the Dark Sorcerers to come find him and kill him.  Robin ran towards the coppice, hoping that it would provide enough cover to allow him to stab the brute in the guts.  Even a Hellhound couldn’t survive having its innards cut out and dashed on the stony ground.

There was a loud howl and the beast came after him.  Robin drew on Excalibur to allow him to run faster, yet he was sure that the Hellhound was faster still.  He could feel its warmth behind him, smell it’s disgusting breath as it breathed on the back of his neck.  It was toying with him, he realised; it could have had him by now, if it had wanted to kill him outright.  The beast knew that he couldn’t escape.  Excalibur shimmered reassurance into his head, yet even it seemed stunned.  There was no escape.

He reached the edge of the coppice and stared.  The dead trees formed an impassable barrier.  No wonder the beast had decided to toy with him.  It had known that he had no way to escape.  He turned and lifted the sword, bracing himself for the final battle.  A blast of hellfire would kill him as surely as anyone else, Excalibur or no Excalibur…

Something moved on the edge of the coppice, a form that seemed to shimmer out of one of the dead trees.  For a second, Robin was struck dumb by wonderment as the brown girl emerged from nowhere, somehow bringing life back to the tree.  She turned and looked at him, giving him a welcoming smile.  The dryad winked at him and reached out for his hand.  Her hand felt like warm wood.  She smelled of forest life, her brown skin infused with an easy sensuality that slipped through all of Robin’s defences.  It seemed to him that she was a girl on the verge of womanhood.

***

The beast howled in rage and opened its jaws, but it was too late.  The dryad pulled Robin into the coppice and they vanished together.  Nothing, not even a wave of hellfire, could burn through the dead trees.

It settled back and began to pace.  It couldn’t imagine how Robin had escaped, or who his strange ally was, but he would have to emerge soon.  And when he did, it would be waiting.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Robin was struck dumb as soon as he entered the coppice.  Kentigern was dead, everyone knew that.  The demon’s passing had torn the life from the land.  And yet, he was surrounded by green trees and he could hear birds calling out in the distance.  The greenery seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see, even though the coppice was terrifyingly small.  He looked down at the dryad, who winked up at him and started to move from tree to tree, heading further into the forest.

No one had even seen a dryad for centuries, if he recalled correctly.  They’d once been nature sprites, inhabiting trees and helping them to grow in exchange for nourishment and shelter, but they’d rarely gotten on with mankind.  The dryads were part of the wild magic that had once roamed the land freely, before Merlin had shut it up behind the boundary lines; according to legend, most of the dryads had either died out or walked into Avalon.  Few had mourned their departure; like most creatures of wild magic, dryads were capable of helping or harming humans on a whim.  Even those towns and villages that had once formed alliances with the dryads had rarely mourned their departure.

The air seemed to sparkle with magic as they walked further into the forest.  It felt almost like the Greenwood, except there was no sense of lurking threat, or unseen eyes watching his every move.  Robin found himself beginning to relax and caught himself, lifting Excalibur as if he expected an attack at any moment.  The dryad looked up at him and giggled, before dancing merrily onto the next tree and merging with it, and then moving onto the next one.  The easy sensuality of her passage seemed to mock his paranoia, as if there was no need to fear anything.  Thoughtfully, feeling no sense of alarm from the sword, Robin returned it to the scabbard.  There was no need to fear danger in the forest.

Ahead of them, the trees suddenly widened and parted, revealing a clearing with a simple house in the centre.  Robin scowled, realising that the coppice was far larger on the inside than on the outside.  Powerful magic was at work here, and even if it wasn't intentionally malicious, it could still be very dangerous.  The house was surrounded by a small garden, smelling of herbs that took him back to the Garrison, where they’d been taught the use of herbs and wildlife in war.  This was different; this felt safe, almost welcoming.  His hand fell to his side, away from his sword.  There was no need to watch for trouble.

The dryad halted at the edge of the clearing, unable to go any further without a tree, and pointed into the garden.  Three small figures popped up, all human.  Robin smiled in welcome as the young girls approached him, waving cheerfully.  They carried themselves with a lack of fear that made him smile.  Few common-born children kept the air of carefree play past their fifth year, but these girls were clearly approaching womanhood.  They wore short dresses that seemed to call attention to their rude health, not their budding sexuality.

He waved back, fighting down an urge to join them in their play.  The garden was affecting him somehow, yet there was no sense of threat or danger.  He smiled at the girls as they came up to him, his eyes narrowing as he realised that they came from very different parts of the world.  One was from the Far East, with yellow-tinted skin, dark slanted eyes and short dark hair.  The second was black, with curly hair and white teeth that flashed out amidst her dark face.  And the third...Robin couldn't place her, even though he’d been all over the world as a Knight of the Round Table.  She had reddish-brown skin, long dark hair and eyes that seemed to have seen everything, despite her innocence.  The sense of magic was growing stronger, surrounding him.

“Come on,” the yellow-skinned girl said.  She took his hand, without fear.  “Granny wants to see you.  She said you’d be coming.”

Robin allowed her to pull him along without resistance, towards the small cottage.  Up close, he could see strange shapes flickering over the wood, as if the cottage itself was tainted by magic.  He'd heard legends of houses built from dryad wood and of what had happened to the unwary owners when the dryads awoke after their hibernation, but he’d never seen any actual examples.  The peasants would have known better, if there were any dryads left in the world.  It struck him suddenly that there was more wild magic loose in the world, outside the boundary lines, than Merlin had been willing to admit.  What else had the old sorcerer concealed from his loyal followers?

The scent of baking bread hit him as soon as the girl pushed open the door, revealing an older woman bending over a cooking stove.  Robin glanced around, but there was still no sign of danger.  The cottage was large enough to house all four of the inhabitants in reasonable comfort – indeed, it gave an impression of more wealth than the average peasant could hope to enjoy – and yet they’d have problems when the girls finally matured.  If they were human – and he wasn't entirely sure if they were – they’d need to find husbands from the mundane world.

“Welcome, Sir Robin,” the old woman said.  She straightened up and turned a gimlet eye on her visitor.  Somehow, she looked more aristocratic than the bluest of blue bloods, surrounded by a sense of power that was only heightened by her age and short gray hair.  She wasn't the kind of person Robin would want to challenge, even with Excalibur in his hand.  He doubted that she would be daunted by the Dark Sorcerers if they came raging into the forest and broke into her house.  “I’ve been expecting you.”

She waved one hand at the chair.  “Please be seated,” she said, as she turned back to the stove.  “I’m thinking that you will be hungry, won’t you?  You can join us for lunch.”

“Thank you,” Robin said, puzzled.  A Knight of the Round Table could claim food and lodging anywhere, yet he hadn’t even had to claim his rights.  And she’d been expecting him...why?  And she'd known his name.  “How did you know that I’d be coming?”

“I saw it in my soup, that I did,” the old lady said.  She grinned at him, daring him to comment.  Everyone knew that reading the future was a tricky business – Merlin’s attitude to oracles didn't help – and yet, somehow he believed her.  “The chicken bones said that you’d be coming; the vegetables said that you would need sanctuary and food; the herbs and spices said that you’d need help to get home.”

She picked up a bowl of soup from the stove and placed it down on the table.  “You’d better get used to calling me Granny, before you ask,” she added.  “Most everyone calls me Granny, these days.  You wouldn't believe what they called me in the days of yore.”

Robin’s stomach rumbled when he smelled the soup.  Granny headed over to the door and shouted for the girls to come in and wash their hands, before she started to ladle the soup out into four bowls.  His natural sense of caution was disappearing fast, even though he didn't quite understand what was happening.  Granny seemed harmless, but the air was still shimmering with magic, which seemed to be in harmony with the world.  The three girls came in and took their places, winking at him when they thought Granny wasn't looking.  The look she directed at them suggested that she had eyes in the back of her head.

“You have forgotten,” Granny said, dryly.  “All is given freely and without obligation.  You’ll recall that later, when She returns to the world.”

Robin frowned.  Everyone knew that eating food from Avalon could have unpleasant consequences.  Some of the Faerie tricked mortals into eating their food, knowing that it would deliver them into their hands – or trap them within Avalon’s oddly distorted rate of time, leaving them to crumble into dust when they returned to the mortal world.  Even the lucky ones could return to a world where everyone they'd known and loved was long dead.  And if Granny had felt obliged to give him the ritual permission to eat, what was she?

“Nothing you might expect,” Granny said, as if she’d read his mind.  Robin started, guiltily.  “But it is well to be careful, young man.  You never quite know where you might end up, do you?”

He picked up one of the spoons and started to eat, slowly.  The soup tasted heavenly, with just the right blend of chicken and vegetables.  He hadn't eaten since he’d been captured – the Dark Sorcerers hadn't bothered to feed him, probably in the hopes that hunger would make it easier to break him – and yet, he would have loved the soup anywhere.  It had the simplicity of peasant food combined with the materials available to the nobility.  Granny passed him a loaf of bread and he gratefully dipped it in the soup.  His stomach demanded more when he’d finished the bowl, but he told it to shut up.  Peasants couldn't afford to feed a Knight of the Round Table for long.  He’d heard stores of Knights who had, quite literally, eaten their unwilling hosts out of house and home.  It was something he was determined never to do himself.

“The dark ones can’t enter here,” Granny said, as Robin pushed his bowl aside.  She smiled, as if the thought of the Dark Sorcerers was somehow amusing.  “They don’t even know about this place – and if they tried to force their way in, they would be obliterated by the power running through the forest.  It would reject the presence of people so contaminated with evil.”

Robin frowned, studying her carefully.  Granny was clearly a powerful magician, even though she seemed to work no overt spells.  Tiffany was powerful too – and there were more powerful female wizards – but she didn't have the same sense of power surrounding Granny.  Wizards had a sense of power, as if their mere presence warped magic around them, but Granny seemed to shimmer along with the magic.  He likened it to singing, or humming along with the band.  She was something very different to the magicians he knew, even the hedge witches who took care of small villages and hamlets near the Greenwood.  Their magic was merely smaller versions of wizardry and sorcery.

“A very long time ago, a man who was only half a man decided that magic had to be bent to his will,” Granny said.  The girls looked up, although they looked as if they’d heard the story before.  “The land was in tune with magic back then, and humans paid their respects to the powerful elements that walked the land, calling on them for help and blessings in exchange for devotion.  They sang songs of power and shifted the land itself, working with the power that flowed through the land to reshape the world.  We knew our place in the workings of the all.

“And the King was the heart of the Land.  He was part of it, married to it; he was the link between humanity and the forces that were so much more than human.  The forces paid homage to the King, for he maintained the connection between humanity and the land.  And then the King died and the half-man reshaped the world to his will.”

Robin listened, thinking hard.  Merlin had to be the half-man; after all, he was a hybrid, the product of a match between human and the inferno.  And if Merlin was the half-man, the King had to be Arthur.  He’d been linked to the Land, merely by being its King – and by being the best of humanity.

“We were tricked,” Granny said.  Her eyes grew misty for a moment, as she looked into the past.  “One of us believed that she was destined to commune with the forces that walked the land, even to the point of having their child, a boy who would grow to unite the land.  But there were darker forces that hated the land and wanted to create their own weapon to taint humanity.  She gave herself to the ritual and discovered, too late to escape, that she would not be mating with the land.  She surrendered herself to the force of ultimate darkness and bore his child.

“And when the half-man declared his war against his father, he reshaped magic to his will.  The masculine wizardry would be allowed to flourish; the feminine craft would be destroyed.  Many of us were killed in his early days, others forced to flee into Avalon and throw ourselves upon the mercy of the forces that were retreating from the land.  He would have destroyed us and them alike if he could, yet the land would not allow such an atrocity.  Instead, we were penned up inside the Greenwood and left to fester.  He cared nothing for what might be created inside the boundary lines.”

Tiffany would love to hear this, Robin thought, although he wasn't entirely sure that that was true.  Everyone knew that wizardry was an organised form of magic – and that sorcery was often disorganised, hence dangerous – and that few women ever became wizards, let alone sorcerers.  Could it be that men and women were inclined towards different kinds of magic?  Wizardry and sorcery were related – indeed, sorcery was a more intense form of wizardry – but could there be a third type of magic, one that Merlin had suppressed when he came to supreme power?

“Men like to think in terms of dominating the world around them,” Granny said.  “They seek control over their surroundings, be it their families or friends or neighbours.  A man in control is a happy man; a man without control is one who desires control, whatever the cost.  He will seek to control his wife if nothing else, taking his weakness out on her.  And the wife can suffer terribly, without being allowed to leave her husband.  The Church says that divorce is a sin, without mentioning the far greater sin of beating one’s wife.”

That was true enough, Robin knew.  He’d been called upon, often enough, to convince a half-drunk villager that beating his wife was not acceptable behaviour.  There had been times when the only way to get the message through skulls thickened by drink had been to beat it out with his fists, hammering it into a man’s head.  And the village priests had been little help.  Even the decent ones had been reluctant to intervene when a man started to beat his wife.

“Women think in terms of going with the flow,” Granny continued.  “They place themselves in tune with the natural world and allow the magic to flow where it will, reshaping themselves to fit the magic.  A witch operates in harmony with the world around her, channelling it to help or hinder her friends.  Alas, we can fall as far as those who tortured you, but our magic is more subtle.  And it can be so much more dangerous.”

Robin ran his hands through his hair.  “I understand, I think,” he said, slowly.  Tiffany would have understood more, he was sure.  But she’d mastered wizardry...there was clearly no rule that said that women couldn't master male-magic, or vice versa.  And that meant...he wished, just for a moment, that he was a theoretical magician.  One of them might have been able to understand completely, perhaps even draw a unified theory of magic.  “Why are you hiding here?”

Granny snorted.  “And you think that the half-man would not have had us killed if we had shown ourselves?”  She asked, dryly.  Robin flushed at the contempt in her tone.  “We hid under his overly long and beaky nose and male pride would force him to crush us, no matter what stood in the way.  And now he is gone and She is awaking and our time is coming around again.”

She looked up, her grey eyes burning into Robin’s eyes.  “And what will your wife do when she discovers that Avalon is stirring and all the creatures that the half-man drove away emerge back into the light?”

Robin shivered.  Tiffany had mentioned the possibility, but the Dark Sorcerers had destroyed any hope of a unified response.  The civil war brewing within the Empire would make it much harder to prepare for war against the supernatural, if war was even possible.  Merlin had been far more powerful than any of the supernatural creatures that had once stalked the land, but Merlin was gone.  How could even the unified might of the human race stand against the supernatural?

And then he realised that part of the answer was right in front of him.

“You could come back with me,” he said, seriously.  “You could teach your art openly, now that Merlin...”

“Don’t mention his name, not here,” Granny snapped.  “You never know Who or What might be listening.”

Robin bowed his head in apology.  “You could teach openly,” he said.  “You could find other candidates openly...”

“We already find witches,” Granny said.  She smirked, as if something had amused her.  “Your techniques for hunting rogue magic-users are designed to find those who warp the magic around them.  We are effectively invisible to them.”

Her smile darkened.  “We can't leave here, not yet,” she added.  “But your wife is welcome to come to this place to learn from us, if she wishes.”

She stood up and nodded to the girls, who headed back out into the garden.  “My apprentices,” she said.  “One day, they will be witches themselves, if we all live that long.  The future is indeterminate.”

“We could protect them,” Robin said.

“You might not be able to protect yourselves,” Granny said.  “Come on; it's time to get you started on your way home.  The Faerie Road isn't far from here.  Your enemies won’t know anything about where you’ve gone.”

Chapter Thirty-Four

Robin had expected a Faerie Mound, like the ones near the major cities.  Instead, there was nothing more than a path leading away into the forest.  Magic crackled around it, somehow in perfect harmony with the land.  The barriers between the mortal world and Avalon were thin here, allowing anyone with the power and will to step across the border and into a whole new world.  In the distance, the path seemed to fade out into shimmering light.

“The dark forces unleashed here warped the Road,” Granny said.  She sounded oddly serious and the three girls, normally bouncing with life, appeared subdued.  “It recovered slowly and took on a new form, one that suited our eyes.  Your master never tried to recover it.”

“The entire city was abandoned,” Robin said.  The Dark Sorcerers wouldn't have risked using the Faerie Road themselves, not when it might have drawn attention to their lair.  They could teleport anyway.  “Are you sure that you won’t come with me?”

Granny nodded.  “Your wife may come to learn from us if she wishes,” she said, firmly.  “We will not share ourselves with your people, not when they will find us an abomination.”

Robin would have liked to argue, but he suspected that she was right.  The House of Magus would be horrified at the discovery of a second branch of magic – and they were often violently opposed to allowing young women to train in magic.  They’d want witchcraft to the catalogued, studied and eventually broken down into its component pieces – and if he understood it correctly, witchcraft couldn't be treated like that.  And then there was the very real danger of Dark Sorcerers learning to use and pervert witchcraft for their own purposes.

“I understand,” he said.  He bowed to the girls, which made them giggle, and gave Granny a full salute.  The elderly lady – and he had no idea just how old she was, although if she lived partly in Avalon she could be nearly a thousand years old – smiled and nodded.  “Thank you for everything.”

“You’re welcome,” Granny said, dryly.  “Just don’t come back.”

Robin nodded and turned, starting to jog down the Faerie Road.  He glanced back, a few moments later, but the shimmer had already swallowed them up and they were gone.  Looking along the path, he kept running, feeling magic shifting around him.  The Faerie Roads led through Avalon to the Mounds Merlin had established when he’d negotiated with the Faerie to create the Faerie Roads, but this Road had been abandoned for years.  It might be as safe as any other Road, or it might have been warped beyond all recognition.  He kept one hand near his sword as the world seemed to shift in front of him, changing its appearance to suit his perceptions.  The forest was closing in...and then it shimmered, to be replaced by walls pressing in around him, forcing him to run straight down the Road.

A chill ran down his spine as the walls took on shape and form.  They appeared to have been carved from stone, each block of black material carved with strange and dangerous glyphs in a language that long predated mankind.  The walls opened up suddenly, revealing what looked like a Dining Hall, a room with a long set of tables and benches.  No fire burned in the grate; the entire room looked as if it had been abandoned centuries ago, yet there was no trace of dust.  Robin slowed, but didn't stop.  Everyone knew that stepping off a Faerie Road could lead to one being permanently trapped in Avalon, or falling prey to the Faerie.  Even Merlin hadn't been able to force them to abandon their traditions; indeed, according to Robin’s tutors, they were their traditions.  A person who stepped off the path would be theirs.

The gothic scene shifted as he kept running, revealing a small group of people standing in front of a throne.  For a moment, Robin thought that he was looking right into the heart of a Faerie Court, where they aped human manners for incomprehensible reasons of their own, and then he realised that the entire scene was frozen.  The people were all carved from stone, perfect representations of human life.  Or perhaps they were people, trapped in stone by a deadly enchantment – who knew what had happened to cast them into Faerie?  He saw a man wearing a crown seated on the throne, a king from the years before Arthur, his face trapped in an expression of hopeless despair.  Robin wanted to reach out and help him, but he knew it was impossible.  He couldn't step off the path.

Robin turned his head and kept running, feeling the world shifting around him again, and again.  He was running over a bridge over a darkened river, flowing onwards into the darkness.  The bridge was terrifyingly thin, almost enough to make him feel dizzy with vertigo.  Around him, other pathways wended their way through the chamber, shimmering in and out of existence.  Every time he looked away, the scene changed.  Desperately, he fixed his eyes on the path and kept running, feeling unseen eyes staring at him with dark intentions.  A howling sprang up in the distance, a woman wailing for her demon lover, and he almost stopped.  He tried to cover his ears, but the sound somehow penetrated through his hands and into his mind.  It was all he could do to keep moving, praying that he could leave it behind.

The bridge seemed to shimmer and he found himself running through a second room of statues.  They weren’t human, but angels, their faces either serenely confident or twisted into expressions of shocking hatred.  Every time he looked away from one of them, it changed position, moving impossibly quickly in the space of a blink.  Robin felt cold terror congealing at the back of his mind, sweat trickling down his armour.  He had the feeling that if one of the stone angels touched him, he would never be seen again.  Their cold eyes watched him, almost daring him to make eye contact.  He looked back at the path and kept running, praying under his breath.  At least they couldn't be real angels.  No one had seen an angel in the mortal world since Merlin had created the Empire.  

A hand grasped at him, seeming to move every time he looked away.  Robin found himself glancing from side to side as the unmoving angels pressed closer, every blink allowing them to reach out for him.  He shivered at the expressions on their stone faces, masks of hatred and rage that were utterly inhuman.  Their teeth looked nastier than anything he'd seen from a vampire, as if they intended to rend his flesh into powder.  He twisted as hands appeared out of nowhere, grasping for him, praying that he could escape.  And then the world shifted around him and the angels were gone.

He was running through a chamber so massive that he could barely see the far walls.  The building, if building it was, seemed to be a skeleton of a building, allowing him to see corridors that moved every time he looked away.  For a moment, he saw a dark figure standing on another path, looking back at him.  He could see nothing, but a shadow where its face should be, yet he felt as if it were oddly familiar.  And then it was gone, leaving him alone.  The walls closed in around him and then faded away, transforming the path into a bridge across a sea of stars.  Cold brilliant pinpoints of light shone out in the darkness, comforting him even as he recoiled from the sheer immensity of their presence.  Each one was a reminder that the universe was so much bigger than humanity, even humans who had tapped the power of dark sorcery.  Ahead of him, he saw an eye opening slowly, revealing that the pathway led right through the eye.  There was a second eye inside the first, and then a third...Robin passed through them without touching anything, without even a sense that there had been anything there to touch.  The Faerie Roads were only presenting an appearance his mind could comprehend, he knew, and yet...he had the sense that if he’d been able to see it as it truly was, he would have learned far more about the nature of reality than any sorcerer, perhaps even Merlin himself.  

The world went dark around him and the path shook, throwing him into the darkness.  Robin had only a moment to realise what had happened as the world seemed to explode into a wave of light and sound, and then he hit the ground hard enough to hurt.  He pulled himself to his feet, drawing his sword, convinced that he was stranded in Faerie.  Perhaps Excalibur could cut him free, even if no mundane weapon could hope to harm the Faerie.  Perhaps...

He was standing in the middle of a small grove of trees.  It didn't feel like Avalon; instead of magic crackling through the air, there was the sense of a recent rainfall.  He stepped forward carefully, sword in hand, until he saw the single statue ahead of him.  It was of a tall handsome man, with muscles on his muscles, one of the legendary heroes of the First Golden Age.  Robin almost smiled.  Sir Kay had been Sir Ector's son and King Arthur’s brother and later seneschal, as well as one of the first Knights of the Round Table.  There were hundreds of legends surrounding him, some complaining of his acid tongue and bullying boorish behaviour, but others spoke of his heroism as one of Arthur's premier warriors and most loyal followers.  He’d been held up as an example to which all Knights should aspire.

Robin bowed to the statue and walked onwards.  Ahead of him, he saw the towers and spires of Camelot.  He’d emerged, he realised now, in the Garden of Fallen Knights, where the Knights of the Round Table were laid to rest after they died in the line of duty.  One day, if there was a body, Robin himself would be buried within the garden.  It wasn't a pleasant thought.  Returning Excalibur to its scabbard, he started to run.  The Faerie Roads were normally safe, but they’d thrown him off the path and who knew how much time had passed in the mortal world?  Tiffany and everyone else he’d ever known might be dust and less than dust by now...

***
The Dark Sorcerer cowered before Maledict’s burning gaze.  He’d been on guard duty when Sir Robin had somehow broken free, killed two of Maledict’s followers and recovered his sword, before running off and vanishing within the city.  It was tempting to believe that Robin had fallen into one of the pools of dark magic and been killed or transfigured beyond recognition, but it would have been foolish to rely on it.  Robin had had the most powerful weapon in the mortal world in his hands, a sword that could have steered him away from the most dangerous parts of the city.  He might well be halfway to the nearest settlement by now – and a simple communications magician would be able to send a message to Camelot, bringing the Knights of the Round Table and the Tribunal’s darker servants down on their heads.

Faye watched expressionlessly as Maledict raged at his victim.  The guard had been monitoring the wards that allowed the Dark Sorcerers to control a fearsome array of creatures they’d summoned from the Darkness.  The hellhounds should have been able to catch and kill any mortal pray, even one armed with such a powerful sword.  Instead, Sir Robin had just...vanished.  Faye had heard hundreds of tales about the Knights of the Round Table, yet she’d never been very impressed with any of them.  And yet, now, all those tales seemed believable.  How had the Knight even managed to escape in the first place?

“Your incompetence could have cost us everything,” Maledict snarled.  Raw magic flashed around his hands, as if it was yearning to be unleashed and deliver a punishment that would live in infamy.  Maledict was not known for rewarding failure; Faye had seen him destroy a man's mind for the crime of failing him, or warping and transforming another failure into a monster that lived in constant pain, yet could never die.  “Where did the Knight of the Round Table go?”

Faye listened to the man’s story, silently anticipating his punishment.  He’d been mentally linked with one of the hellhounds, yet how could Sir Robin have vanished into a tiny coppice of dead trees.  Faye herself had examined the coppice and had been puzzled, cursing the magic that flowed through the entire city.  The same cloud of magic that had turned the ruined city into an ideal base for the Dark Sorcerers made it hard for them to track down their missing prisoner.  It was very tempting to believe that he’d been lost in one of the pools of magic, yet they couldn't assume it.  The city would have to be abandoned.

Maledict’s ranting finally came to an end.  Lifting his hand as the sorcerer cowered, he cast a spell that sent shivers down Faye’s spine.  The victim twitched helplessly, his entire body suddenly bending backwards – the sound of cracking bones was terrifyingly loud – and shattering into a fleshy mass.  Faye watched as blood started to spill out of the bag of flesh and powdered bones that was all that was left of the failure.  A handful of the younger Dark Sorcerers looked away, terrified of their master, but the others watched, seemingly dispassionately.  They all knew that a show of weakness could have disastrous consequences.

“Begin evacuating everything we have to the fallback base,” Maledict ordered, his words tainted with power.  Faye shook her head to clear it of the sudden urge to do exactly as he ordered, knowing that he was using magic to compel them.  “Take the remaining prisoners to the altar and sacrifice them – there’s no time to have any more fun with them.”

Faye sensed some discontent, but no one was foolish enough to protest out loud.  They’d all joined the Dark Sorcerers because they wanted power, yet some of them had very basic needs and desires.  The women they’d kidnapped and bound to helpless servitude had pleased them, but now they’d have to be abandoned.  Faye, who lacked such weaknesses herself, was rather amused at their thoughts.  Their base weaknesses would bring them down; at base, there was only power and the will to seize it.  She looked up at her master and smiled to herself.  After this blow to his power, perhaps there would be a chance to remove Maledict completely...

“I will take five of us to the nearest settlement and lay waste to it,” Maledict continued.  Faye nodded, realising that her master wasn't that far gone, not yet.  If Sir Robin was making his way to the nearest settlement, they could ensure that all he would find would be ruins and a slaughtered population.  “The rest of you will complete the evacuation of the base, understand?”

Faye made quick to bow her head in submission, along with the others.  Maledict hadn't told them their ultimate destination, aware that what they didn't know they couldn't tell.  They’d chosen the city because it could hide them, yet now...did they really need to hide?  She considered the thought as she hurried to do her master’s bidding; were they powerful enough to come out into the open and dare the forces of law and order to stop them?  It was tempting...but she knew that there was no point in risking everything.  The longer they remained undefeated, the greater the instability tearing the Empire apart.  And then it would be theirs...

***
The village of Erskine lay on the banks of the River Clyde, upstream from Kentigern.  It had once been a fairly prosperous town, but the magic unleashed at Kentigern had had a baleful effect on the entire region, with mutated fish appearing in the river and strange sightings terrifying the locals at night.  Most of them had moved away, leaving only a relative handful of hardy souls within thirty miles of Kentigern.  It did have some advantages – there were few tax collectors daring enough to try to collect taxes from the area – but it wasn't enough to convince much of the population to remain.

Maledict materialised in the centre of the village, wand already raised and ready.  He spoke a curse as soon as the village shimmered into existence and the headman’s house exploded into fire and light.  The communications magician was dead before he realised that the village was under attack.  Maledict’s followers rapidly tore apart the remainder of the village, slaughtering everyone who showed their faces and burning every building, even the ones made of resistant stone.  Flames spread rapidly, directed into the fields where they consumed the crops and a handful of villagers hiding amongst their livelihood.  There was no time for sadism, or for sacrifice, and part of his soul mourned the waste.  The rest of him was intent on destruction before they had to retreat.

Losing Sir Robin – and Excalibur – had been a blow.  There was no point in trying to avoid it, even though his pride made it hard to admit failure.  If the Knight made it back to Camelot, they’d lose their lair as well.  Maledict had planned to evacuate quickly when Merlin had been alive, knowing that they wouldn’t be able to hold Merlin off when he came to destroy then, but now...he’d thought that they were invincible.  It was intolerable!

His lips twitched, humourlessly.  The fallback lair wasn't intended as anything other than a temporary place to regroup – there was a far better place to go.  And it was somewhere that the forces of law and order, even the Tribunal, would never expect.  Duke Valditch was in for a nasty surprise...

Laughing, he teleported back to the lair.  There was much work to do.

Chapter Thirty-Five

The Arena was little more than a large glass dome, its structure reinforced by every spell known to the House of Magus and powered by a natural wellspring of magic in Camelot.  Powerful forces, even those that verged on the demonic, could be unleashed within the dome, without creating any threat to the rest of the city.  Tiffany watched from the spectator’s booth as the contestants for the position of High Magus filed into the dome, their faces grim and determined.  They all knew that the winner would enjoy undreamt-of power and status as the High Magus – the losers, if they were lucky, would merely be publicly defeated.  The unlucky ones would be dead, or worse than dead.

Each of the contestants had been assigned a position, allowing random match-ups until only one emerged as the winner.  Tiffany watched, as dispassionately as she could, as the first duels were fought.  Two of the contestants were not only powerful magicians and sorcerers, but also intent on imposing a magical hegemony over the world.  They believed that only those with magic had the right to rule – as Merlin had ruled – and that his departure meant that another magician could step forward to take his mantle.  That wouldn't have gone down well with either of the other two Houses of Parliament, but powerful sorcerers wouldn't have cared much for the opinions of mundane humans, no matter how much blue blood flowed through their veins.  She silently prayed for their defeat, wishing that there had been a way to rig the contests in her favour.  Merlin, who had created the original Arena, had foreclosed that possibility.  No contestant could enter while under a jinx, or drugged, or anything else that might interfere with his ability to work magic.  And none of them would have agreed to take a fall for the good of the Empire.  They would all put themselves first.

The first duel was spectacular.  Both sorcerers threw raw magic at each other, their minds shaping it into deadly forms and spells.  They seemed evenly matched until one of them suddenly lost control of his powers, unleashing wild magic on himself.  His body warped and mutated until it was a monstrous shambling form, easily dispatched by his relieved opponent.  Tiffany concealed a smile, knowing that the winner had drained himself before facing his second opponent, without any time to recover.  The High Magus had to be someone capable of facing down more than one or two opponents at once.  The next sorcerer dispatched him quickly and brutally.

Sorcerer Black seemed to be just as capable as she had expected – but then, Merlin wouldn't have appointed a weakling to run the Tribunal.  He fought with a cold calm precision that suggested both knowledge and skill – and the firm grasp on his own sanity that separated a sorcerer from a dark sorcerer.  His first opponent was dispatched quickly, the second took longer, long enough that Tiffany began to worry.  The Sorcerer Boyd had long been known as a magical supremacist, with a reputation that made the Duke of Tara look calm and polite.  His reputation had protected him from many duels outside the Arena, but now he had to fight, without protection.  Sorcerer Black disposed of him eventually, leaving him a crippled mass on the Arena ground.

Tiffany’s eyes narrowed as the final duel began.  There was no official way of determining just how strong any given magician actually was, but sorcerers generally took care of it themselves.  They always contested against each other, intent on proving themselves the best, even when more restrained personalities would have cooperated instead.  And yet Sorcerer Black had been a relative unknown until after Merlin’s departure, a man who had never stepped into the House of Magus.  Why had he hidden himself?  Fear of Merlin – or something else?  Why would a spymaster come into the light?

She was suddenly aware of a pulse of heat from her wedding ring.  It had stayed warm, giving her what reassurance she could that her husband was alive, yet she had been able to learn nothing else.  The magical spells developed for surveillance, normally capable of locating anyone who didn’t have access to concealing spells and the power to make them work, had been unable to locate Sir Robin.  She had feared the worst, but now…she looked up, realising that the small crowd that had gathered to watch the duels was scattering.  A bloodstained figure was making its way across the ground towards her.  It was Robin!

Tiffany forgot the dignity that her mother had drummed into her and ran to him, taking him in her arms and holding him tightly.  His face was bruised and his armour was covered in blood, staining her dress, but she didn’t care.  He wrapped his arms around her, both of them lost in the moment.  Just to have him back…somehow, it boosted her confidence, even knowing that the House of Lords was trying to impeach her.  Let them try to impeach her now.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Robin said, as they drew apart slightly.  “I was held up…”

Tiffany had to laugh.  “And where have you been?”

There was an apologetic cough behind her.  “My Lady, pardon the intrusion, but who is this?”

Tiffany turned, frowning.  Sorcerer Black stood there, one hand on his wand.  Two combat magicians had followed him, both clearly intent on proving their loyalty to the new High Magus.  She frowned, opening her mouth to demand to know what he meant, when Robin stepped past her.  His hand dropped to the sword at his belt and half-drew the glowing blade from its scabbard.

“I still hold Excalibur,” he said, calmly.  “I am not under their control.”

“That has to be determined,” Sorcerer Black said.  Tiffany scowled at him, wanting to protest that she knew her husband – and Excalibur – but he was right.  Robin had been a captive of the Dark Sorcerers and they had clearly tortured him.  They might have broken his will to resist and then enchanted him, turning him into a weapon they could use against Camelot.  “I need to run a few tests, now.”

There was no give in his voice at all.  “Do them,” Tiffany said, firmly.  What if Robin was under their control?  She would have to give the order to kill him, if he couldn’t be freed from their enchantments.  And the Dark Sorcerers were very skilled at bending others to their will.  “Run the tests here and now.”

Sorcerer Black looked reluctant – there was a growing audience of dignities, keen to see if Robin was free of outside control – but nodded.  Drawing his wand, he first tested Excalibur to check that it truly was the legendary sword, and then turned to Robin himself.  Tiffany felt a whole series of spells crawling over Robin’s body, each one repelled by his armour.  She let out a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding.  Her husband had come back to her, intact in body and soul.  How many other wives could say the same?

“There doesn’t seem to be any controlling spells placed on him,” Sorcerer Black said, finally.  He looked oddly reluctant to say anything else, but pressed ahead anyway.  “His armour is intact, yet it also appears to have been badly pressed.  I don’t know if it can regenerate from such a beating.”

“It should be able to,” Robin said.  Tiffany could hear the concern in his voice.  The Knights of the Round Table were linked to their armour when they were knighted and never lost the connection, until the day they died.  Robin could never be given a second set of armour – if it was even possible to produce new armour without Merlin’s spells.  Merlin had created the original set of spells and no one, as far as she knew, had duplicated his work.  “I’m not dead, after all.”

“Nor are you their slave,” Sorcerer Black said, formally.  “Welcome home, Sir Robin.”

“Thank you,” Robin said.  He winked at Tiffany, who had grasped his hand as soon as the sorcerers had cleared Robin.  “It’s great to be back.”

Tiffany summoned a messenger and started to speak rapidly.  “Summon the Privy Council to meet in thirty minutes,” she ordered.  That would give Robin long enough to wash and undergo a quick visit to the Healers, before they faced the Privy Council.  “Tell them…”

“Tell them that we know where the Dark Sorcerers are,” Robin said, flatly.  “And tell them that if we move quickly, we can get the bastards before they escape.”

***
Robin had always disliked visits to the Healers, even though he’d never met a Healer who was unworthy of the title.  Indeed, there was something about the nature of healing magic – and the oaths sworn by Healers when they started their apprenticeships – that prevented them from ever harming a living being.  Some of them were even vegetations, restricting themselves to fruits and nuts that had fallen from the trees and landed on the ground.  It was something he'd never been able to understand – he was partial to well-done steaks himself – but it was part of their magic.  They couldn’t change without surrendering their powers.

The woman poked and prodded at him, once he’d stripped and ordered the armour to retract into bracelets on his arms.  He hadn’t realised just how badly he hurt until she’d started to examine him, but the torture spells had left his skin feeling as if he’d been beaten heavily, without leaving actual physical evidence.  It was a neat system, he acknowledged, if as evil as Hell.  He would like to have met the person who had devised the spells before slicing him in half and condemning him to the fires.  As long as the victim’s heart didn’t give out, the Dark Sorcerers could inflict as much suffering as they liked, without a care in the world.

“Not too badly damaged,” the Healer said, finally.  She passed Robin a glass of purple liquid and stood over him threateningly until he finally swallowed about half the glass.  It tasted as if something had crawled inside the bottle and died there, which wasn't too unlikely.  Many of the charms and potions used by Healers had sickening origins.  Robin knew girls who refused to take potion to help soothe their menstrual cramps because they knew what went into the medicine.  “You’re a bit sensitive to magic and that will probably fade away in the next few weeks, but no other damage.”

Robin nodded, slowly.  Tiffany’s hand seemed to sparkle with magic and touching her felt…strange, oddly tingly.  The new High Magus seemed to glow with power, as if he was almost as powerful and capable as Merlin himself.  There were people who were allergic to magic, who couldn’t endure its presence, forcing them to live very isolated lives.  The thought of leaving Tiffany was intolerable.  

“That’s good to hear,” Tiffany said.  She watched with amusement as Robin dressed.  He’d tried to protest, but she’d insisted on sending a page to their rooms to collect a tunic and belt for her husband, rather than allowing him to wear the outfit he’d worn while in captivity.  She wanted to burn his old outfit, pointing out that it was ruined beyond repair.  “Coming?”

She led him through the Keep’s corridors and passageways, allowing everyone to see that he – and Excalibur – was back.  From what she’d said, in the two days he’d been missing, the entire city had been mourning his loss – or, rather, they’d been mourning Excalibur’s loss.  The sword, a weapon out of legend, had become a powerful symbol in its own right and the thought of it falling into the hands of the Dark Sorcerers was horrifying.  Robin touched the blade, feeling the sword’s flickering presence in his hand, and smiled.  It was definitely good to be home – and as soon as they could find some privacy, he would show he just how much he’d missed her.

Tiffany winked at him – clearly having similar thoughts herself – and opened a door, leading him into the War Room.  It had changed a bit since Robin had last been in the room, with paper maps of the entire world scattered over the table and a small force of communications magicians sitting in one corner, ready to send messages to their counterparts across the world.  The Privy Council rose to their feet as they entered, Robin returning the salutes of the Major General and the Baron.  Even the new High Magus, who looked rather like the cat who had swallowed the canary, was pleased to see him.  Robin wondered how long that would last.

He strode to the table and placed his hands on it.  “They’re at Kentigern,” he said, firmly.  He’d seen the stars; he knew where he’d been.  “They were using the wild magic unleashed in the city to camouflage their presence.”

“That makes sense,” Sorcerer Black said.  The new High Magus studied the table, thoughtfully.  “We’ve always been reluctant to send patrols through the ruined city – they must have picked up on our reluctance and decided that they could conceal themselves there.”

He frowned.  “It isn’t an easy place to approach,” he added.  “There’s no Faerie Road for forty miles and…”

That wasn't true, Robin knew, but it would be a betrayal of confidence to reveal the existence of Granny’s little coven.  Besides, they didn’t need the Faerie Road.  “We need to teleport a strike force into the city,” he said.  “Every moment we delay gives them a chance to get out and cover their tracks.”

“Opening a teleport gateway – or even direct teleporting – into the city would be impossible,” Sorcerer Black said, flatly.  “Only a Dark Sorcerer could accept the risk of interference from the wild magic so casually.  We would need to teleport to here” – he tapped a location on one of the maps – “and advance on foot from there.  It would give them time to know that we’re on our way…”

“Maybe they don’t have many defences,” the Major General said.  “Correct me if I’m wrong, but wouldn’t wards be detectable at a distance?  It would give their game away…”

“A passive ward might pass unnoticed,” Sorcerer Black said.  He looked up and smiled a surprisingly confident smile.  “I’ll put together a strike force from the Tribunal – combat magicians and sorcerers, men trained to face Dark Sorcerers in their own element.  We’ll open up a gateway, sneak into the city and launch an attack.  If we’re really lucky, we might even be able to set up our own anti-teleport defences and prevent them from escaping.”

And prevent us from retreating, Robin thought, coldly.  It wasn't a bad idea – teleporting gave the Dark Sorcerers a significant advantage – but it would also trap them…and they knew that they would receive no mercy from the forces of law and order.  They’d live long enough to be interrogated, their defences broken down and their minds ransacked for useful information, and then they would be executed.  It would force them to fight like trapped rats in a sack.

“I’m coming with you,” Robin said, firmly.  “I’d also like to take a handful of other Knights, armed with magical weapons.  We cannot afford any mistakes on this mission…”

Sorcerer Black eyed him, unpleasantly.  “They’d just get in the way,” he said.  “We cannot afford to have mundane humans caught in a magical crossfire.”

The entire world was caught in a magical crossfire, Robin knew, but he wasn't about to point that out.  “I have Excalibur,” he said, touching the blade’s hilt.  “I don’t think that anyone can dismiss Excalibur as useless.”

“I suppose not,” Sorcerer Black said, reluctantly.  “However, we need to be careful.  Dark Sorcerers are formidable enemies and we need to trap them before they can escape, or we will have to find them again and again.”

“Excalibur can hide its presence,” Robin assured him.  “And we will be very careful.”

He could sense the sorcerer’s irritation, but they didn’t have time to scrabble over precedence or jurisdiction.  The Tribunal wanted to capture the Dark Sorcerers themselves, without help, yet Robin had seen enough to convince him that this particular bunch of Dark Sorcerers was far more powerful than anyone had yet realised.  What they’d done to Londinium might be nothing, compared to what they would be ultimately able to do.  Without Merlin, there would be no limits on their ambition – or their lust for power.

“I have a question,” Sorcerer Black said.  “How did you get here so quickly?”

“I had some help,” Robin said, and touched Excalibur.  Let them draw what conclusions they liked from his actions.  Besides, for all he knew, the sword could help him to teleport.

“We need to act fast,” Tiffany said, her voice calling attention back to her position at the head of the table.  “This may be our one chance to deal with them all in a single stroke.”

“Maybe not,” Robin said.  “They mentioned a Duke.  It could be that their next base is in Tara.”

“And everyone is reluctant to release any forces to help us deal with Duke Blackrock,” Tiffany said.  She shook her head, long strands of red hair cascading down her back.  “Anyone who has any combat power wants to keep it, after what happened to Londinium.”

Robin frowned, thoughtfully.  A plan was forming at the back of his mind.  Perhaps they could deal with Duke Blackrock without a full-scale invasion of Tara.  And if he was working with the Dark Sorcerers, knocking the Duke out of play would impede their plans…

“On the other hand, a victory – even driving them back into hiding – would work in our favour,” Lord Chancellor Rupert pointed out.  “And if we appeared to be winning, the Lords and Commons would be more willing to support us.”

“If,” Tiffany said.  Robin glanced at her, sharply.  There was something in her voice…something bad.  What had happened since he’d been captured, only two days ago?  “We cannot afford to keep reacting to the enemy’s movements my friends.  We have to take the initiative ourselves and strike hard.”

On that note, the meeting ended.

Chapter Thirty-Six

“Don’t you dare get lost again,” Tiffany said, thirty minutes later.  Her warm breath felt soothing against his skin.  He didn't want to let go of her.  “Come back to me; do you understand?”

“Yes,” Robin promised.  He gave her one last tight hug and kiss, and then stepped back from her.  “I understand…”

The chanting in the background rose to a crescendo and the teleport gate shimmered into existence.  It was a square of light, set against the darkened stone of Beneficence, the only place in Camelot where a teleport gate could be opened.  Robin felt a chill crawling down his spine as he peered into the light, seeing things that were not and never had been, reminding him of his run down the defunct Faerie Road.  There were echoes of nightmares within the void…

A loud crack echoed through the chamber and the gate stabilised, becoming a doorway into an abandoned town near Kentigern.  Robin hefted Excalibur, drawing what reassurance he could from the blade, and stepped forward.  There was no sense of transition as he passed through the gate, but the cool air struck him at once as he appeared in the town.  Over the years, it had decayed and become host to all kinds of supernatural wildlife, yet nothing appeared to be dangerous.  He lifted the sword and draw on its power, enhancing his senses as best as he could.  There was still no sense of danger.

“Come on in,” he said, sticking his head back through the teleport gate.  “The water’s fine.”

The Tribunal’s sorcerers, men dressed in black robes with grim expressions, as if they’d talked to God and didn’t like the answers, marched forwards and into the abandoned town.  They held their wands at the ready as they spread out, casting subtle spells to scan for any dangerous presences or wards that might alert the Dark Sorcerers to their arrival, but found nothing.  A team of investigative magicians followed, with four Knights of the Round Table bringing up the rear.  Each one carried a magical weapon; the Spear of Judgement, the Spear of Destiny, the Silver Bow and the Bloodstained Blade.  The latter had always given Robin the creeps, even though it wasn't, strictly speaking, an evil weapon.  He had always had the impression that the weapon was just biding its time.

“Close the gateway,” Sorcerer Black ordered.  It flicked and vanished, stranding them without a line of easy retreat.  Not that Robin disagreed; if the gateway had remained open, the Dark Sorcerers would have had a way into Beneficence itself.  “I’ll take point; everyone else, stay behind me.”

Robin concealed a smile as the small party began to walk towards Kentigern, cloaked with a handful of concealing spells.  Sorcerer Black kept his wand out and at the ready, watching for any wards that might reveal their presence, or magical traps that would weaken them before they reached the enemy lair.  Robin kept one hand on his sword, allowing it to enhance his Sight.  Wild magic shimmered over the land, tainted with the darkness of the pit, but there seemed to be nothing aimed specifically at intruders.

It was a sobering thought.  The Dark Sorcerers had chosen their base well, knowing that few people would dare to enter a city that had been destroyed by wild magic.  It was a far superior base to the Greenwood, even though Kentigern had been touched by darkest magic; there were few truly dangerous creatures in the city, at least not to a magician.  He looked up at the abandoned buildings and shivered, feeling the cold air blowing across the town.  One day, if the Greenwood started to expand, all of humanity’s towns and cities might look the same.  

Something crashed in the distance and he jumped, half-drawing his sword before he realised that there was nothing to fear.  The wind had blown something loose and it had fallen, crashing into the ground.  His eyes moved from building to building, seeking a threat and finding nothing, yet he was starting to feel as if he were being watched.  A sense of vague unease was creeping over him, weakening his will to carry on.  He touched the hilt of his sword and felt another wave of reassurance.  There was truly nothing to fear.

“A deterrent spell,” Sorcerer Black said, with satisfaction.  He sounded pleased with himself, although Robin wondered why he hadn’t detected it earlier.  “They blended it in with the wild magic, using it to encourage people to stay out of the city.  We’ll just have to push onwards, I’m afraid.”

Robin scowled at his back as the sorcerer kept moving, pushing against the psychic pressure as if he were walking into a strong headwind.  The sense of unease kept growing stronger as they walked westwards, into the outskirts of Kentigern itself, but nothing else materialised to stop them.  He glanced back at the rest of the party and allowed himself a moment of relief.  Tribunal-trained combat magicians and Knights of the Round Table might never have been friends, but that worked in their favour.  Both sides were so determined not to show weakness in front of the other that they just kept going, pushing against the growing aversion field.

Sorcerer Black stopped and held up a hand.  “A warning ward,” he said, by way of explanation.  Robin opened his Sight and saw the invisible line, shimmering in the air and waiting for someone foolish enough to cross it.  Beyond it, he could see a network of invisible defences, ranging from mild hexes to change spells and jinxes.  Anyone who walked through the ward without preparing themselves would discover – too late – that they had been turned into a caterpillar, if not something even more unpleasant.  “It’s going to have to come down.”

Robin sighed and settled down to wait as the sorcerers went to work.  Tiny, but complex magic flared over their hands as they started to dismantle the ward, careful to avoid alerting its creators.  Anyone capable of producing a stable ward would know to create a mental link that would alert them if anything happened to take down the ward, which meant that a single slip would alert the Dark Sorcerers that their base was under attack.

“Need to be careful here,” Sorcerer Black muttered.  “I can get us through the warning ward, but they’ve pegged half of the ambushes to pools of wild magic and I can’t dispel them.  Don’t put a foot wrong…”

The ward shimmered into visibility briefly and then vanished.  Robin drew on his Sight and the entire world seemed to take on an eerie colouration, showing him the invisible traps waiting for anyone pushy enough to force their way through the aversion ward.  Sorcerer Black led the way forward, very carefully.  Robin followed him, feeling a cold chill running down his spine as he saw some of the nastier ambush spells.  One of them would direct the full force of a pool of wild magic onto anyone unlucky enough to trigger it, transmuting them beyond recognition.  He remembered Thorn, the once-human creature he had encountered in the Greenwood, and shivered again.  Anyone who survived the touch of wild magic would no longer be human, nor would they be welcome in the human world.  And if the Greenwood was expanding…

He pushed the thought aside as they approached the next network of traps, an invisible spider’s web just waiting for someone to stumble into it and trap themselves.  Sorcerer Black dispelled a handful of the spells, clearing a path through the ruined city and up towards the coppice Robin remembered, but the rest had to be avoided.  It struck Robin that anyone watching them without the Sight would be completely confused, wondering why a bunch of grown men were wending their way through the ruined city.  They wouldn't be able to see the invisible death traps waiting for an unwary victim.

The coppice of dead wood didn’t glow when he peered at it through his Sight.  Indeed, there seemed to be no trace of magic there at all.  If Robin hadn’t found help there, and a quick way to return home, he would have doubted his own story.  He hoped that Granny and her young apprentices had found their way to safety, or that they would be safe inside the coppice…if the Dark Sorcerers had remained behind to await the raid.  They might not believe that Robin had made it home so quickly…he suspected that they would decide to evacuate and flee, unless they believed that they were now so powerful that they could come out into the open…

He heard a noise up ahead and whipped out his sword.  Excalibur glowed as he held it up at the ready, hearing the sound of heavy breathing coming closer.  It sounded like a huge invisible dog; even with Excalibur boosting his sight, he could barely see the hellhound as it opened its jaws and made to catch him between its teeth.  The rest of the team scattered as Robin jumped forward and slashed at the hellhound, slicing through its inhumanly-warm skin.  There was no howl of rage or pain from the beast; it simply twisted and nearly snapped Robin out of the air with its jaws.  The colossal mouth hung open and it breathed a stream of hellfire towards the sorcerers, who warded themselves just in time.  Robin nipped forward and sliced off the brute’s front paw, but they grew back again a second later.  The hellhound wasn't even remotely linked to the mundane world.  It had been created in the fires of hell and empowered by a Dark Sorcerer’s will.  For a moment, it was completely visible – glowing eyes promising a horrific death for the puny humans in its path – and then it was invisible again, even hiding from Excalibur.  Robin could hear its movements and he jumped just in time.  A moment later, it knocked one of the other Knights over backwards and tore through his armour as if it were nothing stronger than paper.

Robin howled in pain and lunged forward, glowing blade extended out in front of him.  The beast couldn’t turn swiftly enough to stop him and he rammed his sword into its guts, tearing into its burning flesh.  And yet the beast survived; Robin hacked and hacked, yet it always rebuilt itself.  Another wave of hellfire almost killed him; hellfire burned the soul, not the physical body.  Enough hellfire could kill anyone.

“Over here,” Sorcerer Black shouted.  Robin glanced at him, saw what he had in mind, and leapt backwards.  The maddened hellhound came after him, clearly hurting even though the cuts Robin had inflicted had closed almost at once.  Robin ran through the drawn circle on the ground and jumped out of the trap.  The hellhound crashed into an invisible wall.  It shimmered into visibility, confused and puzzled, and then it glared at the sorcerer with unlimited malice.  Robin wouldn’t have cared to be on the receiving end of that stare.

If Sorcerer Black was bothered, he showed no sign of it.  “Caught you,” he said, using his wand to complete the circle he’d drawn on the ground.  The mystic symbols he’d drawn would trap the beast in the circle, at least until a team of sorcerers could tame it or banish it back to hell.  “It will be stuck there forever, at least until some idiot breaks the circle.”

Robin nodded.  Anyone could free a demon from a bottle, or a summoning circle, simply by breaking the barrier.  There were stories about people who’d done that and few of them ended very well.  Sometimes, the demon could be tricked back into confinement, but more often the unlucky person would be killed and the demon would go on a rampage, at least until it was sucked back to hell.

“Come on,” he said.  “That won’t be the only unpleasant surprise around here.”

He took one last look at the coppice and led the way down to the tunnel entrance. According to the old plans he’d had a chance to study, while Sorcerer Black had been assembling his team, the Dark Sorcerers had built their lair in a series of underground catacombs that had once held wine, shipped in from all over the empire.  It had suited them admirably, providing them with a safe hiding place and plenty of rock to serve as a barrier to magical probes.  Now…the hidden entrance lay open, inviting them to enter the caves.  He hefted Excalibur and allowed the sword’s glow to illuminate the tunnel.  Nothing rose to bar their way.

“Be very careful,” Sorcerer Black said, as they slipped into the complex.  Darkened tunnels greeted them, the lights he recalled seeing had been removed.  The sorcerers muttered spells and created light-globes of their own, illuminating the chamber ahead of them.  Robin swore aloud as his eyes took in the sight; hundreds of dead bodies, dumped on the ground.  Men, women and children, scarred by torture, their faces rent by terror…they had died in screaming agony, just to feed their captors insatiable demand for power.  He saw a young girl who bore more than a passing resemblance to Tiffany and swore silently that the Dark Sorcerers would be held accountable for their crimes, but it seemed futile.  The Dark Sorcerers were long gone.

“They’re moving,” Sir Peter said.  The Knight of the Round Table stepped forward.  “They’re moving…”

Robin opened his mouth to protect, but the words died in his throat.  The corpses were staggering to their feet, pale hands reaching out towards the newcomers.  He swore aloud as he realised what the Dark Sorcerers had created and unleashed.  It had been years since the last zombie plague, but the human race had never forgotten what a handful of zombies had done in the Fertile Crescent.  Thousands of humans had been killed, only to rise again as soulless monsters, bent on killing their fellow humans to add to their numbers.  In the end, they had all been destroyed, but the price had been horrific.  A moaning sound rose from zombie throats as they staggered forward, breaking the spell of horror that had held Robin frozen, unable to move.

Excalibur shone like the sun and the zombies recoiled.  Unsure of what he was doing, or why, Robin stepped forward and allowed the golden glow to shimmer out ahead of him, covering the zombies in golden light.  The heat rose sharply and the zombies flared to dust, melting away under Excalibur’s pitiless fire.  Robin felt himself pulled forward and pushed his legs into action, even as he was recalling Merlin’s words.  Excalibur, like all magical weapons, had a mind of its own.  There would come a time when the sword chose to move on to the next wielder, leaving Robin as…merely human.

“They’re dust,” Sorcerer Black said.  For once, he sounded awed.  “All of the spells and traps within this complex have been destroyed.”

Robin looked down at Excalibur, surprised.  He hadn’t realised that the sword could do that, but then he’d been thinking of it as a sword, rather than a living being with a mind of its own.  Excalibur hummed in his hand, as if it was quietly laughing at him, before he returned it to its scabbard.  The lights the sorcerers had created spread out, illuminating the complex.  There were no more dead bodies to be seen.

“They’re gone,” Sorcerer Black said, disgustedly.  “Very well; we will pair up and investigate the complex, and then call for a forensic examination to see if they’ve left any clues.  Sir Robin, you’re with me.”

Robin nodded and allowed Sorcerer Black to lead him through the complex, back to the library he’d seen.  It didn’t surprise him to discover that it had been emptied, with the books torn from the shelves and transported elsewhere.  Some of those books had been very rare – and dangerous, just what a Dark Sorcerer, who might be self-taught, would need.  If they could be recovered…but they hadn’t been left behind.  The reports from the other searchers suggested that the Dark Sorcerers had evacuated in good order, killing their captives and taking everything they might still be able to use.

“Nothing,” Sorcerer Black said, after they’d completed their search of the complex.  A forensic sorcerer might be able to turn up something, but Robin wasn't hopeful.  The Dark Sorcerers had swept the complex with dark magic before they left, creating a haze that would interfere with any sensitive trying to locate their position.  “They could be anywhere in the world by now.”

“Maybe,” Robin said.  He actually had a fair idea as to where the Dark Sorcerers had gone, although there was only one way to find out.  The sword was still glowing in his mind – and with it, he was sure he could hunt down the remaining Dark Sorcerers.  “I think I know where to find them.”

“Good for you,” Sorcerer Black said, crossly.  Robin was puzzled at his attitude, until he remembered that Sorcerer Black, the new High Magus, had needed a success to cement his hold on the title.  And even if Robin was right, it was a job for the Knights of the Round Table, not the Tribunal.  “I’ll open a gateway outside and get the next team in to sweep the ruins.  The rest of us can go home and prepare for their next attack.”

Robin didn’t bother to argue.  Instead, he walked back out behind the sorcerer and glanced towards the coppice.  It was still a frozen mass of dead trees, and yet he was sure, just for a second, that he could see something moving within the trees.  The hellhound roared, distracting everyone from the coppice, and Robin smiled.  Granny had invited Tiffany to visit her, after all.  Perhaps there would be some answers then.

“I hope you’re right,” Sorcerer Black said, as they opened the gateway.  “If you’re wrong…where the hell are they?”

“They ran from us,” Robin said, ducking the question.  “I find that encouraging, don’t you?”

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Lucas yawned and tried to hide it.

His father, seated regally on his throne, gave him a sharp look and Lucas flushed.  The monthly meeting with his father’s subjects – or, rather, the peasant headmen who were loyal to his father personally – was always tedious, if only because very few peasants would dare to tell the Duke to his face that he was doing a bad job.  Mostly, they spent hours flattering their lord and master and bare minutes petitioning him for boons or remittances.  His father taxed them mercilessly, using taxation as both a rod to beat them and a reward for good service.  An exception from yearly taxation could make the difference between a reasonably comfortable existence – at least for peasants – and being thrown into the poorhouse.

The peasants themselves kept their faces impassive, but who cared what peasants thought, anyway?  They were the ones who stayed loyal when the more ambitious fled to the free cities, braving the dangers of being branded runaways in the hopes of gaining a little more freedom.  Their hard-worn faces, and hard-worn clothes, only managed to convey an impression of dirt and squalor.  They had little hope of receiving anything from his father unless his father was in a good mood.  Even their chastity of their daughters belonged to their lord.

Deliberately, he allowed his eyes to wander to the cluster of womenfolk at the rear of the room.  As peasant custom dictated, they had brought their wives and some of their prettier daughters, but the women were expected to be seen and not heard.  One girl, who would have been pretty if she cleaned herself up a little, returned Lucas’s stare with interest, a silent invitation to a brief tryst – or even a long-term affair.  No one would seriously expect him to marry such a girl, even if he got her with child, but even a brief period as the Heir’s mistress could bring her vast rewards, at least for peasants.  It was whispered that peasant women were willing to do anything and perform every possible sexual act, no matter how degrading, in exchange for a regular stipend.  Lucas was tempted, despite the horrors that lurked in his mind every time he closed his eyes, and yet…a second girl seemed much more tempting.  She had lowered her eyes in an attempt to remain demure, as custom demanded, but she was very tense.  Her father had probably brought her in the hopes that she would catch the lord’s eye.  It only proved what Lucas had been told since he’d been old enough to walk.  Without their lords and masters, the peasants would slip back into sloth, idleness and sin.

He concealed a second yawn with an effort, listening as the peasants fawned over his father.  The father of the second girl – he was sure he saw a resemblance – was currently telling his father how great he was, in great and florid detail.  God alone knew what he wanted, but Lucas hoped that he’d get to the point sometime within the next few hours.  Maybe he hoped that he could trade his daughter’s virtue for better treatment or some other reward – or perhaps he was just hoping to interest the Duke, in the hopes of calling in the favour later in life.  Lucas rolled his eyes and settled back on his chair, one hand dropping to caress the hilt of his sword.  Ever since they’d visited the ruined city, he’d carried a sword with him at all times.  It made him feel safer.

A thunderous crash from the gatehouse brought him to his feet, along with his father.  Something was very badly wrong, and yet there had been no alert.  The peasant women began to scatter, their sheep-like attitude driving them to panic, rather than trying to do anything to escape.  But then, no one raised peasant women to think for themselves.  The male peasants seemed caught between remaining on their knees, as was custom when they faced the Duke, or getting to their feet themselves.  It might not have mattered; peasants were only permitted clubs and bows as weapons, and they certainly hadn’t been allowed to bring them to the meeting.  They might have decided to use their weapons on the Duke.

Lucas started forward as a second crash, followed by a scream, echoed through the castle.  Magic – or explosives; either one could have produced that sound.  The castle was under attack, but by whom?  He drew his sword, thinking hard; the commoners, intent on revenge for the destruction of a free city, or the Tribunal, coming to punish his father for allying with the Dark Sorcerers.  Or, perhaps, the Dark Sorcerers themselves, driven by their madness into lashing out at their ally?  There was no way to know until the enemy showed itself.

A line of guardsmen ran into the room, weapons in hand.  The magicians his father kept on retainer hadn’t showed themselves, even though they should have been in the room within seconds.  Lucas wondered suddenly if one of them was behind the chaos, just as a dull rumbling shook the castle and sent several of the peasants crashing to their knees.  Their womenfolk huddled together in one corner as footsteps, loud enough to shake the entire building, echoed down the corridor, advancing towards the chamber.  Lucas felt sweat forming on his hands and he wiped them frantically on his trousers, wishing that he'd thought to wear a suit of armour.  The golden threaded shirt and trousers he wore might look spectacular, but they would provide absolutely no protection at all.  He glanced over at his father and blinked in surprise.  His father had his impassive gaze on, watching the closed door as if nothing could surprise him, even the sudden arrival of the Tribunal.

The door crashed open and Lucas winced.  A figure stood there, face hidden behind a cowl that cast an uncanny shadow inside the hood.  Two red points of light floated within the shadow; Lucas had an uneasy feeling that they were eyes.  Gasps and screams echoed around the chamber as the figure stepped forward, raw power bleeding from every pore.  There was no mistaking the appearance of someone almost consumed by their own magic, a Dark Sorcerer.  Half the guardsmen retreated to the rear of the room; the remainder stepped forward, some of them shaking so badly that they were more dangerous to their companions than to the intruder.  They formed a line between the Duke and the newcomer, who seemed amused at their puny weapons.  There was still no sign of the Duke’s magicians.

In one short motion, the intruder threw off his hood.  The face below was barely human, with so much raw power burning through it that Lucas was convinced that he could see the skull through nearly translucent flesh.  It was a sickening sight, enough to make a pair of guardsmen stagger backwards, suddenly afraid of the consequences of brandishing edged weapons in front of a sorcerer.  A sorcerer worthy of the name – even a mere magician – would know protections that would laugh at any mundane blade.  The Duke showed no sign of fear, but then Lucas knew that his father could face his own execution without revealing a hint of his emotions.  For his own part…he wanted to run.

Cold terror trickled down the back of his spine as the intruder smiled, a horrific curving of the lips that suggested outright madness.  He would have run if he could, but his legs seemed heavy and immobile.  The rational part of his mind pointed out that they were caught in a glamour, a spell enhancing the effect of the sorcerer’s appearance, yet he couldn’t break the spell.  All the protections he had been given, as his father’s son, seemed worthless.  The spell was simply too subtle to be deflected easily, even by another magician.

“Your Grace,” the sorcerer said.  His voice was cracked, with more than a hint of absolute insanity lurking behind his words.  It was a terrifying sound, as if he was about to burst out into maniacal laughter, or start using his magic on his terrified audience.  “Is this how you normally greet your allies?”

He gestured and the remaining guardsmen, the ones brave enough to hold their ground, burst into flame.  Lucas shouted in horror, unheard in the din, as their bodies were consumed by uncanny fires, the stench of burning flesh blowing right into his face.  The peasant women were screaming constantly, the men retreating rapidly or dropping to their knees and prostrating themselves in front of the sorcerer.  Lucas stumbled backwards, almost tripping over as his legs started to work again, not quite daring to flee.  The guards at the rear of the room watched their comrades dying, horror etched over their pale faces.  Several of them were being noisily sick.

“Any man is a fool who gives his loyalty to Dukes when a sorcerer stands near,” the Dark Sorcerer said.  He fixed his uncanny red eyes on Lucas’s father.  “We require the use of your castle as a base of operations.”

Lucas’s father kept his voice calm and composed, somehow.  Lucas had no idea how he did it, not with those red eyes boring down into him.  If Lucas had been on the receiving end, he wouldn't have dared to argue, or even to raise his voice, not when the Dark Sorcerer could kill him as easily as he had the guardsmen.  Somehow, he was sure that all the protections he’d been given were about as much use as his tunic and shirt.

“You coming here was never part of the deal,” Lucas’s father said.  There were some gasps from the remaining peasants, shocked at hearing that their lord and master had concluded an agreement with the Dark Sorcerers, the enemies of everyone.  The ones who remembered the abandoned village – and how Dark Sorcerers had slaughtered everyone present to fuel their dark rituals – would be horrified.  “By coming here, you place us all in jeopardy.”

“I am altering the deal,” the Dark Sorcerer said, flatly.  “Someone betrayed us to the hated Tribunal.  Someone close to you, perhaps; you may have believed that you no longer needed us, and so we could be disposed of without fear.”  His cold eyes bored into Lucas’s father’s eyes.  “Did you betray us?”

“If I had revealed that I was working with you,” Lucas’s father pointed out evenly, “my head would have been cut off by the Tribunal.  They would not forgive me, even if I surrendered you and your men to their justice.  I would merely be the next one to be arrested.”

They stared at each other for a long moment, and then the Dark Sorcerer nodded.  “In order that you do not betray us, we will be staying here,” he said.  “Your castle is already in our hands.  We require your cooperation and your servitude.  Should you fail to serve us properly, we will destroy your mind and turn your body into a puppet.”

“You would be welcome here,” Lucas heard his father say.  For the first time, he heard a harsh edge in his father’s words.  Having the Dark Sorcerers under his roof only heightened the chances of discovery, which would bring the Tribunal down on their heads.  And now there was a new High Magus, there would no longer be a distracting power struggle within the House of Magus.  “You will need to remain out of sight…”

“We do not trust you,” the Dark Sorcerer informed him.  “The security of your castle is in our hands and it will remain so until the end of the war.”  The inhuman face twisted into a sneer.  “You will be in no danger of discovery.  The secret will not be allowed to slip out.”

He gestured at the peasants and they stumbled forwards, pulled by invisible leashes.  Lucas watched in horror as they dropped to their knees in front of the Dark Sorcerer, who placed his hand on their foreheads and bound them to him, using a very dangerous spell to turn them into his loyal servants.  A moment later, it was the turn of the guards.  Resistance was futile; a guard who tried to run was casually incinerated, his remains deposited on the floor.  In the end, only Lucas and his father remained immune to their power.

It made sense, he told himself frantically, trying to convince himself that he wouldn’t end up like the poor wretches who were now kneeling in front of the sorcerer, begging for an order that they could obey.  There was something helpless and suffering inside their eyes; he met the eyes of the pretty girl he’d seen earlier and shuddered at what he saw in her dark eyes.  They wouldn't want to convert the nobility.  It would set off alarms the moment his father walked into the House of Lords.  It makes sense that they wouldn't try to control us.

“I trust that we understand one another,” the sorcerer said.  He grinned at Lucas, a expression that chilled him to the bone.  “Fail us and you will die, horribly.  You are ours now.”

He nodded to Lucas, who found his legs turning of their own volition and marching him out of the chamber.  Behind him, he heard screams from human throats, but the strange compulsion wouldn't let him go until he was back in his rooms, trapped.  They were both trapped – and so was his sister.  His father’s scheming had finally gone too far.

***
The kneeling peasant girl offered her throat for the knife, her body obeying his commands even as her soul struggled to free itself – but it was impossible.  Maledict drew the knife across her pretty throat and watched as she collapsed, blood pooling around her body.  The surge of dark energy from the sacrifice flowed into him and he laughed, his senses expanding to the point where he could sense the other Dark Sorcerers within the castle.  They owned it now, whatever the Duke might think – and he could never betray them, even without being compelled into obedience.  After making his deal with Maledict and his followers, admitting the truth would be signing his own death warrant.  He would just have to pray that Maledict didn’t intend to keep him under permanent control…

Chuckling, Maledict stepped away from the body and summoned Faye.  They had a battle to plan, the next – perhaps the decisive – encounter with the remains of Merlin’s lapdogs.  And then the world would be his.

***
“You must be out of your mind,” Tiffany said.  “Do you seriously expect to get away with it?”

Robin considered, and then nodded.  They lay together on her bed, naked and holding each other after their passion had been spent.  Idly, he allowed his fingers to trace the curve of her breast, enjoying the feel of it against his skin.  He’d been celibate until marriage – Knights of the Round Table always were – and now he found it hard to let go of her.  She seemed to have the same problem; after all, like most noblewomen, she’d been a virgin until her wedding night.  The only problem they’d had was that he’d had to take the sword to bed with him, and she’d taken her wand.

“I don’t think that we can deal with Tara any other way,” Robin said.  “If the Dark Sorcerers are there, the Garrison will be in real trouble if they try to advance against the Duke’s fortifications.  Even if they don’t take an active hand in the fighting, we can’t afford heavy losses…”

“I can’t afford to lose you,” Tiffany said.  Her green eyes flashed fire.  “Do you have a desire to get yourself killed?  This is suicide!”

Robin touched the sword where it lay, on the edge of the bed.  After discovering how it could be used against the zombies, he’d experimented a little, trying to discover what else the sword could do.  Merlin had said that Excalibur was far more than just a sword; Robin was finally, he suspected, starting to understand what the old sorcerer had meant.  The blade seemed to have nearly limitless power.  No wonder it was feared by Elves and Faerie.  It would be able to end their immortal lives.

“There isn’t anyone else who can go,” Robin said, seriously.  “No one else has Excalibur, or the magic needed to slip into the castle without being detected.  And once I get inside, I should be able to find my way to the Duke without serious problems…Excalibur will help.  And then…”

“And then you’ll kill him,” Tiffany said.  “Have you considered killing his wife and daughter as well?”

“His wife…does she deserve to die?”  Robin asked.  Lady Blackrock had defended her husband, but that was a wifely duty.  “And his daughter certainly doesn’t deserve to die.”

Tiffany’s eyes softened.  “Poor kid,” she said.  “Do you think…?”

She couldn’t finish the sentence.  The thought was sickening, yet it was alarmingly possible.  If Duke Blackrock had molested young peasant children, why not molest his own daughter?  But then, his daughter could have complained to Camelot, even to Merlin himself.  It would have been an insane risk, and yet…the Duke might well be insane now, even if he had merely been perverted when he’d been arrested.  Robin would not have put anything past Duke Blackrock.

“I’ll take her out of the castle if I can,” Robin promised.  “If not…I’ll deal with her somehow, I swear.”

“You’re insane,” Tiffany said.  She rolled over on top of him, one hand slipping down to his manhood.  “You’re trusting everything to Excalibur and a dragon.”

Robin felt himself stiffen as she grasped his penis and slowly started to caress it.  “It’s not quite suicide,” he said, seriously.  “And if we don’t deal with Tara now, the dark Sorcerers will have a chance to regroup.  We have to hit them now.”

Tiffany’s hand stopped moving.  “And what if the Dark Sorcerers are there?”

“I’ll think of something,” Robin assured her.  He lifted his lips to meet hers.  “I have a very cunning plan.”

She slipped herself onto him, impaling herself on him…and then there was no more time for anything, but passion.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

From high overhead, Tara was a darkened landmass, illuminated only by a handful of fires in the larger villages.  The darkness was so absolute away from the villages that Robin felt a chill peering down into the shadows, the chill that humanity had felt in the years before Merlin, when dark forces had ruled the night and inhuman creatures had dominated the world.  All the old tales of gods, nature sprites and monsters echoed through his head, a reminder that Merlin’s reign had been a golden age for humanity.  And if the Greenwood began to expand, now that the boundary lines were falling apart, the dark days might be back.  He clutched the sword in one hand, feeling a wave of reassurance and power.  The evil days might come soon, but there would be an end.

The dragon’s wings beat silently against the air, heading towards the heart of Tara – and Castle Blackrock.  Tara was a richly magical land, with hundreds of tiny spots of Greenwood inhabited by leprechauns and centaurs, and dragons weren't uncommon in the skies.  Anywhere else, outside the northern lands where the dragons dwelled, a dragon’s presence would be cause for alarm, but not on Tara.  He smiled at the thought as he peered down into the darkness.  They wouldn’t think that anyone would be insane enough to try what he was planning, even if they did wield one of the most powerful weapons in all of existence.  Surprise – and sheer incomprehension – would be his weapons.  And after everything that had happened recently, from the vast destruction the Dark Sorcerers had unleashed to his own captivity, it felt so good to be taking the offensive.

He touched the sword’s blade again and brought up his Sight.  Tara was glowing with thin blue lines of wild magic, shimmering at the edge of his awareness, barely hemmed in by the flickering boundary lines.  Beyond them, there were a handful of wards raised by hedge witches and village magicians, trying to keep out the darkness that threatened their land.  Robin couldn’t tell if they were aware of the threat of an advancing army or if they sensed the growing threat from the Greenwood.  Those who lived close to the outposts of wild magic, and the gateway to Avalon, would be the first to feel it as the seasons changed and wild magic started to spread upon the land once again.

In the distance, Castle Blackrock was a dark forbidding presence, glowing with magic.  Duke Blackrock had been lucky in his choice of ancestors, because they’d built the castle in a very good defensive position.  They’d even recruited one of the giants of old to help with the building, before they’d all been driven into the Greenwood or slaughtered by Merlin and the early Knights of the Round Table.  The blue glow of magic showed that they’d built the castle on top of a magical wellspring, the very heart of magic in the land.  And if they’d truly wanted to make the castle invincible, they could have done so.  Instead…they’d missed a single dimension.

Eleanor looked back at him as a single flicker of moonlight broke through the clouds, the light flickering oddly off her bare breasts.  Robin had to force himself to look away as she spoke, knowing that her dragon would react badly to even the slightest hint of intimacy between them.  Dragon riders, always female, bonded so closely with their dragons that even friendship was hard and romance was impossible.

“We’ll be overhead in a minute,” she said.  “Are you still sure you want to go ahead with this crazy plan?”

Robin looked back towards Castle Blackrock and nodded.  Truthfully, the plan had seemed a great deal cleverer when he’d devised it while talking to Tiffany.  Now, faced with actually carrying it out, he wanted to do something a little less challenging.  Fighting a team of Dark Sorcerers stark naked, perhaps.  It could hardly be more dangerous, even with Excalibur at his side.

“Yes,” he said, flatly.  The Castle was growing nearer now as the dragon altered course.  Down below, in the darkness, they would barely see the creature – and they wouldn't dare try to attack it.  A full-grown dragon was not only more intelligent than a human, but often more powerful than anything below a sorcerer.  Irritating one did nothing good for one’s life expectancy.  By the time they realised that they’d made a mistake, it would be far too late.  “Give me a shove when it’s time to go.”

He swung his legs over the dragon’s side and teetered on the brink of vertigo.  Below him was nothing, but the ground – hundreds of meters below.  He felt nervous, staring down at the abyss, even as he clutched the pack he’d been given by the wizards he’d enlisted to help with his plan. They swore blind that it should work, but none of them were coming with him.  For some reason, there had been a shortage of volunteers.  The dragon twitched and he felt himself slipping towards the brink, before he caught himself.  The castle was much closer now, illuminated only by a pair of torches on the roof.  That was a bad element of the design, Robin thought, with something very much like a sneer.  The guards on the battlements would have almost no night vision.

“Go,” Eleanor said.

Robin felt her hand shoving him and then he plummeted towards the ground.  The dragon was lost in the darkness instantly and the castle rose up to meet him with terrifying speed.  He felt a hot trickle running down his legs as impact seemed imminent – and even Excalibur’s scabbard couldn’t protect him from that – before there was a powerful jerk and his fall slowed, sharply.  The cloth blanket the wizards had sworn would break his fall had billowed out above him, saving him from certain death.  Robin cursed as strong winds blew at him, perhaps part of the castle’s own defences, and for a heart-stopping moment he thought that he was going to miss the castle altogether.  And then he was down on the battlements, the cloth billowing down on top of him.  It was suddenly very heavy and throwing it off took more time than he had hoped.

He drew Excalibur as he heard the sounds of running footsteps.  He’d been careful not to make a noise, but there had been a noise as the cloth settled to the ground.  The sword’s glow illuminated the battlements, revealing two guards in armour, both trying desperately to cover their eyes.  Despite their torches, they were unable to look away from the light and see into the darkness.  Their night vision had been utterly destroyed.  Some of the Knights would have said that it was dishonourable, but Robin leapt forward anyway and bisected both of the guards, watching their bodies crashing to the ground in front of him.  There was no time to waste.  The chances were good that the guards had already sounded the alarm.

The Tribunal had presented him with a chart of the castle, one that had clearly been produced by someone who had spent a great deal of time in Castle Blackrock.  Robin had demanded to know why, if the Tribunal had had such access, they hadn’t reported the Duke’s taste for immature children to Merlin earlier, only to be reminded that the Tribunal was strictly concerned with matters involving dark magic.  Tiffany’s response to that had been explosive, but Robin suspected that Sorcerer Black had been telling the truth.  The Tribunal was a bureaucracy and bureaucratic organisations tended to follow the letter of the law, rather than considering its underlying intentions.  Or perhaps they’d had blackmail in mind…

Robin pushed aside his doubts as he slipped through the gate.  No one was running up the stairs towards him, which he chose to interpret as a good sign.  On the other hand, the stairway was so narrow that any defenders might feel that they could afford to block him in the claustrophobic passageway, forcing him to fight at a disadvantage.  Excalibur helped his night vision, allowing him to run down the stairs without fear of falling.  There was a single guard at the bottom, looking up in surprise.  Robin killed him before he had a chance to sound the alarm.

Glancing around, he fitted his location to the map he’d memorised and started to run, using his thoughts to reshape his armour around him.  Anyone looking at him from a distance would think they were looking at one of the Duke’s men, wearing the ugly armour and badly-tailored uniforms he’d designed for them.   If he encountered someone who knew all the guards by sight, he would be in trouble, but he had a feeling that the Duke – like most of the upper classes – wouldn't pay attention to any of the hired help.  They existed to take his money and do the dirty work for him, nothing else.  The thought that they might have thoughts and feelings – and lives – of their own would be alien to him.  Or so Robin hoped.  If the Duke had been working to earn the loyalty of his men, they would fight for him all the harder.

The passageways became more ornate as he headed further down into the castle.  Castle Blackrock was more than just the Duke’s residence; it was his administrative centre as well.  Robin had considered expanding the mission to attacking the Duke’s loyal followers – who were controlled by spells, just to make sure they stayed loyal – but that would have been too dangerous.  Excalibur was powerful, and Robin now had an idea how to use that power, yet it didn’t make him invincible.  And every time he drew the blade, he risked having it detected by a magician working for the Duke.

He stopped and slipped into a shadow as three maids came around the corner.  They looked tired, rather than happy, barely exchanging more than one or two words with each other.  One of them limped badly, suggesting that she’d been beaten, something that wasn't uncommon in the noblest houses.  Robin felt a cold flash of anger as he watched the girl disappearing down the corridor, wondering what her crime had been.  Perhaps she’d been caught stealing food…or perhaps she had refused an advance from the Duke or one of his followers.  She looked a little too old for the Duke, but there was no way to know for sure.

Excalibur hummed suddenly in his hand as he approached a wooden door.  There was an invisible presence in the air, shimmering in the air.  Two glowing red eyes appeared out of nowhere, fixed upon his face.  The demon knew him for who he was, yet before it could scream a warning Robin brought up Excalibur.  There was a brilliant flash of light and the demon vanished, heading back to Hell.  Robin cursed under his breath as he slashed through the lock on the door and kicked it open.  The magicians in the castle would definitely have noticed that their demon had been kicked back to where it had come from, years ago.  There was suddenly no time to lose.

Inside, there was a pack of ten guards, sitting around and chatting idly.  They clearly hadn’t been expecting an attack without some warning, but the demon would have dealt with most of the possible threats.  A sorcerer could have banished the demon, yet there would have been some warning…Robin pushed the thought aside and ran forward, Excalibur flaring in his hand.  He killed the first two guards before they had a chance to draw their own weapons and cut down the third before he could get his sword out of the scabbard.  The Duke’s hired killers weren't used to fighting someone who could fight back.

Excalibur seemed to merge into him as the remaining guards lunged forward.  They were one…moving and lashing out with inhuman speed.  The guards were doing the only thing that would give them half a chance, part of his mind noted absently, but it wouldn't save them.  Excalibur sliced through their blades as if they didn’t even exist, cutting effortlessly through skin and bone.  They died, one by one, unable to believe what had come for them.  And Robin came back to himself, standing awash in a nightmare of blood and death.

He ran for the inner door and into the Duke’s private chambers.  They were as luxurious as they’d been led to expect, decorated with gold and artworks from all over the Empire and crammed with expensive wines and snacks.  Some of the artworks were officially forbidden, he noted absently, even to someone like the Duke.  The artwork from the Serpent Empire, detailing mass sacrifices that had powered the magician-priests of their bloodthirsty gods, could be used by Dark Sorcerers – for all he knew, that was where the Duke had gotten his ideas about allying with the forces of darkness.  

The next door crashed down in front of him and he found himself in the Duke’s bedroom.  He was stumbling to his feet, desperately trying to recover a pistol from a hidden compartment near the bed, kicking away the small girl who lay beside him.  Red hot rage flared up in Robin as he saw the wounds on the girl’s body and he lunged forward, Excalibur shining like the son.  The Duke could barely stutter two words out before Robin sliced through his skull and executed him.  His body burst into flame – the girl stumbled away, desperately trying to flee – and fell onto the bed.  A moment later, the fire started to spread.

“No,” a voice said, from behind him.  Robin spun around to see Lady Blackrock.  The Duke’s wife had one hand at her throat, staring at the remains of her husband.  His body was getting a foretaste of Hell…and his soul had long departed.  “You can’t…I surrender!”

Robin wasn't listening.  A woman of her status would have been believed, if she had spoken out against her husband.  She could have had him executed before he killed any more children after raping them, but she’d said nothing.  She’d probably even helped him to find his victims.  The rage overpowered him and Lady Blackrock dropped dead, next to her husband.  Robin snarled and fought down the rest of the rage.  His fury demanded that he slaughter the entire population of the castle, but he knew how impossible that was, now that the enemy were alerted.

The girl was crying, staring at him; she was unsure if he was a saviour or just another monster.  Robin held out a hand to her and she came to him tentatively, clearly expecting a blow, or worse.  He picked her up and carried her into the next set of rooms, whispering for her to be quiet.  They didn’t have much time.  He kicked down a second set of doors and found himself in a small nursery.  The Lady Gwendolyn, Heir to the Duchy of Tara, stumbled awake, staring at him.  She was only thirteen years old, older than her father’s pet.  Robin reminded himself that there was no evidence that the young Lady – Duchess now, he supposed – knew anything about her father’s crimes, but the urge to simply end her life was almost overwhelming.  Only his training – and the honour of the Knights of the Round Table – kept him from slicing through her nightgown and cutting her in half.

“Come with me,” Robin snapped.  He was prepared to knock the girl out if necessary, but she came to him anyway, her eyes blinking away sleep.  “I’m taking you out of here.”

He picked up the Duke’s plaything and led the way out of the corridor.  Gwendolyn looked hesitant, and then followed, as slowly as she could.  Robin turned and glared at him and she instantly moved faster, clearly stalling as long as she dared.  There was a shout in the distance and a line of armed men ran towards him, escorted by a pair of combat magicians.  After the Dark Sorcerers, the combat magicians were easy prey for Excalibur; Robin ran forward, sliced his way through the stunned guards, and slaughtered both of the magicians.  The remaining guards turned to run, realising what they were facing, but Robin showed them no mercy.  It was impossible to hold back the bloodlust, not now he’d seen what these men served.  Had any of them offered their preteen daughters to the Duke, hoping to curry his favour?

Both girls were screaming as Robin came back to them and dragged them both along the corridor and down the great central staircase.  The fire that had started in the Duke’s chamber was spreading and a number of servants were attempting to fight the fire, but they all stopped when they saw Robin.  A handful saw his face and tried to run; others, bound by their loyalty spells, threw themselves on him, hoping to drag him down by sheer numbers.  At least their spells denied them weapons, thankfully; even so, he had to hack too many of them down in order to escape.  The girls were screaming constantly now; too stunned to do anything else, but obey.  He dragged them out to the stables and pulled out a horse.  The Duke’s personal horse, a magnificent chestnuts stallion, whinnied unpleasantly when he pulled him out, but a sharp glare brought it to its senses.  Mounting the girls in front of him, he jumped up behind them and slapped the horse’s rump.  It started to gallop towards the gates…

Robin lifted Excalibur, shaped a thought with his mind, and snapped the blade down.  A flash of energy exploded from the sword and struck the gate, knocking it open and scattering the guards.  He dug in his boots and the horse sped up, galloping over the drawbridge and down the long road to where the dragon would have landed, waiting for him.  Tara would wake up to discover that her Duke was dead and his Heir was a prisoner in Camelot.  And Tiffany, with the Duchess before her majority and a prisoner, would be able to appoint a regent of her choice.

One thought bothered him as the horse carried him further into the darkness.  He’d expected to encounter the Dark Sorcerers again, but there had been no sign of them.  And the magic wards he'd faced, even the demon, were the work of magicians…

So where, he asked himself, were the Dark Sorcerers?

Chapter Thirty-Nine

The Master of Beneficence College – or the Mistress, as it was currently – lived in a suite of rooms that wouldn't have shamed a Duke.  Now, every tabletop was covered in books, while tiny pocket dimensions held a collection of thousands of older books, each one belonging to the current Mistress.  Lady Aylia had been reading books since she was three and collecting them since she was four, books focused on magic, myth and the history of the times before the Pendragon Empire.  Some of the books were officially forbidden, although the laws hadn't been openly enforced for generations, but, as always, the aristocracy was an exception to certain basic laws.  Aylia had come to believe, over the years, that Merlin had deliberately encouraged rebellious personalities to develop, using them to keep his empire running.  And besides, if he had known about his impending departure, he might have wanted some of the pre-empire knowledge available to his successors.

It was an attitude that puzzled Aylia, although she was more than familiar with male pride and the effect it could have on their behaviour.  Her father had married the wrong woman and was totally unable to admit it to himself, while he supported his wife in every one of her decisions about their two daughters.  Aylia had been unable to tolerate the thought of a life as nothing more than a brainless decorative ornament and so she had rebelled, first into books, then into Beneficence as one of the few female students and finally onto the Privy Council itself.  It still amused her, whenever she bothered to think about it, that her mother still thought that her daughter had abandoned her, even though she was more important – socially – than almost anyone else below a Duke.  The Privy Council was the ultimate achievement, all the more so because membership depended on impressing Merlin, not through birth or some ridiculous feat of arms.

She shrugged and turned the page.  Many of the books on magic collected at the college were aging – and so tinted with magic that they were impossible to copy, even by using a scribe to copy it physically.  Aylia had had a team of wizards working on copying some of the books safely, but the results hadn’t been particularly encouraging.  Their copies tended to speak of magical spells in the most vague and imprecise terms, a necessary safety precaution that made actual learning very difficult.  It was sobering to remember that even reading the yellowing volume in her hands – without taking proper precautions – could have disastrous effects on the reader.

The book, written prior to Merlin by a monk, talked about contact with the Faerie and the lesser creatures of Avalon.  Back then, according to the writer, humanity had merely been one part of a vast interconnected network of debts and obligations – and very much the least of the figures on the network.  The night had never belonged to humanity and wise humans had paid tribute to the things that went bump in the night, fearing what they would do if angered.  Children had been stolen and replaced by changelings, adults had been cursed or transformed by exposure to their magic and entire villages had been obliterated for a petty offence.  The Fair Folk demanded respect from those they saw as lesser beings and didn't hesitate to punish those who were insufficiently respectful.  They demanded praise in florid terms that would make a Duke – or one of the Eastern Mandarins – blush.

She made a series of notes on one of her notepads, frowning.  The reports were clear; the boundary lines were falling and, in some cases, had already collapsed.  For a while, the creatures in the Greenwood wouldn't realise what had happened, or remain there out of habit, like a creature in the zoo still pacing behind bars that had long since been removed.  And then they would come spilling out of Avalon into lands they had lost when Merlin had created the boundary lines, driving the humans in front of them back into lands that had been human before Merlin.  There were few reliable reports from so long ago, but according to the book very few patches of land had been purely human – and they were worthless.  The coming storm would be the worst that the human race had ever experienced.

Impatiently, unsure of what had disturbed her, she put the book down and muttered a charm over its faded cover, sealing it until she returned.  Pulling herself to her feet, she strode over to the statue of Merlin in the centre of the room and gazed down upon it, shaking her head.  Had Merlin been too proud to admit that he wasn't truly immortal, after all?  Or had he simply decided to leave the empire to stand or fall on its own?  And yet...he could have taken any number of simple steps to ensure a stable transition to a new form of authority, without leaving the Houses of Parliament to scrabble for supremacy and the Dark Sorcerers to run riot.  Why had he simply abandoned them to their fate?

Angrily, she strode over to the mirror and glared at her own image.  Long brown hair framed a heart-shaped face, with overly-large brown eyes and a cute little nose.  She had hated her appearance as a child, for first she’d been plain and then alarmingly attractive to the young trainee wizards who made up most of the student body, but now...she felt just right.  The last Master of Beneficence College had been old, with a long white beard and a habit of laughing at jokes no one else found funny, yet she had never felt as if she had stolen his place.  But then, magic was based on confidence as much as anything else and her certainty that she could do the job had helped to ensure that she received the position.  And Merlin’s rule had been absolute back then.  No one had dared offer more than a handful of objections, few based on anything other than sexism...

And yet, something was wrong.  She turned her head from side to side, trying to understand the faint unease at the back of her mind.  It might have been because of the subject matter, because of the impending invasion from the Greenwood, or because of something else.  Beneficence College was nearly a thousand years old.  Over the years, magic had seeped into its very soul, creating a building that was far more than the sum of its parts.  It was alive, in a sense, and the Master of the College was linked to its being.  And the faint sense of unease was emanating from the College, a building that had seen hundreds of thousands of wizards in training – and hundreds of them die in the course of their studies.  Even Merlin’s departure hadn't left the College in such a state of unease.

Something was definitely very wrong.

***
From the outside, the walls surrounding Beneficence were surprisingly low, considering the importance of the building.  But then, the walls had never been the main defence for a college of magic.  The wards that flickered across the grounds between the walls and the college itself were the true defence, ones built up over the years by the Masters of Beneficence Collage.  They couldn't beat Merlin’s wards for sheer power, but they were the subtlest wards in the mundane world.  Students of Beneficence, once graduated, were free to return at any time they pleased, to add to their learning or merely to visit friends among the teaching staff.  Other visitors would be gently pressed towards the reception building, where the staff would meet them and welcome them, if they were truly welcome.  Espionage was rife among magic-users and other Colleges had been known to try to slip spies into the college.  And Dark Sorcerers, or people with bad intentions, were kept out.  Only Merlin could have torn down the walls.

Faye braced herself and walked forward, feeling the wards pressing down around her, the inhuman intelligences peering into her mind.  If they knew what she had become...but no, they recognised her as a former student.  Carefully, she glanced back at the line of Dark Sorcerers following her and led the way towards the building itself.  It had taken hours to gather a number of young wizards in training from the pubs in Camelot, risking discovery by the thousands of Guardsmen in the city, but it had been surprisingly easy.  Or perhaps it was understandable.  Camelot, under Merlin’s rule, had been the safest city in the Empire.  The authorities wouldn't quite have realised, even after what had happened to Londinium, that that no longer held true.  And the young students they’d kidnapped had provided just enough of a glamour to fool the wards – or so she hoped.  Failure would mean almost certain death.

She felt an odd twinge as they processed across the lawn, unsure – for once – if power was worth so much.  The students of Beneficence had treated her badly, but the College itself had done her no harm.  And it had provided a basic background in magic theory that most of the other Dark Sorcerers lacked, something that had given her an advantage when it came to channelling the vast magical power unleashed by dark sorcery.  She almost hesitated, but stopped, knowing that showing weakness now would be fatal.  The power she would achieve, even as the second among the Dark Sorcerers, was worth any risk.  She would finally be able to punish those who had mocked her and told her to get back to the kitchen, where any properly brought up young woman from the lower classes should stay.  The dream kept her going as they made it through the remaining wards and reached one of the many side doors.

The only time the great gates of Beneficence were opened was when new students were allowed to enter the building for the first time, or when they left after graduating.  Normally, students and masters alike used the side doors, which remained open morning, noon and night.  She was lost, for a second, in memory, remembering a sour-faced teacher who had guarded one of the doors, sardonically handing out detentions and canings to students who crept back in, somewhat the worse for drink.  The only way to avoid him had been to climb over the walls and then up the side of the building, onto a second-floor balcony.  It had provided the kind of challenge that the senior wizards approved of, believing that if a drunken wizard could still climb while under the influence of drink, it would help teach them how to control their powers – and not to become drunk on their own power, like the Dark Sorcerers.

Now...she pressed against the door and it opened, with a creaking sound she well remembered from the past.  The ghosts of the past seemed to push in around her as she stepped forward, into the college itself, feeling the wards shimmering around her.  Young wizards, without any real ability to control their powers, often lost control; the wards prevented them from doing any real damage to the college or most of their fellow students.  And now...a looming form appeared out of the darkness.

“Report to the Mistress in the morning...”

The voice broke off as Faye cast a silencing spell, stunning the master before he could say anything else.  He clearly hadn't been expecting trouble, or all hell would have broken loose.  Faye watched him fall to the ground, and then beckoned the other Dark Sorcerers into the building.  They’d all been briefed on the inside of the building – Beneficence, unlike other magical colleges, wasn't given to rearranging its innards at will – and they knew where to go.  She led a small team up towards the domain of the masters and mistresses, feeling the wards flickering into life around her.  They had sensed the spell she had cast...but would they know that she wasn't a student?  She had used a student-level spell...

Every young student they encountered was rapidly stunned, before they could sound the alarm.  Faye could sense the wards becoming more and more agitated, as they had when students from the upper classes had started to launch attacks on students from the lower classes – and the lower classes had fought back.  The then-Master had lost his position over that crisis, or so she had been led to believe.  Beneficence was the foremost magical school in the world.  Merlin himself had intervened to ensure that the Master was replaced, for failure on such a scale could not be tolerated.  Her lips quirked, briefly.  He hadn't bothered to intervene when Faye had been bullied and hounded out of the college.

The students bunked in tiny dorms, ten to a room.  Unsurprisingly, the senior students and the masters all had far more luxurious quarters.  They were guarded by wards to prevent the students from breaking in and playing tricks on their superiors – and her glamour wouldn't take them any further.  She looked up at her master and nodded.  He cast a spell that slammed into the wards, overpowering them with terrifying speed.  Hundreds of men, women and children had died, sacrificed to provide the power for the spell.  Even operating in a tame duchy, they had risked discovery by abducting so many people, but the effort had not been in vain.  The wards collapsed and the Dark Sorcerers charged forward.

***
The wards fell apart and Aylia, mentally linked to the wards, staggered and almost fell to the ground.  She’d sensed the stunning spells, but she hadn’t realised that they weren't the work of students, not until it had been too late.  How had the Dark Sorcerers even tricked the wards in the first place  It should have been impossible – but they had access to more raw power than anyone short of Merlin himself.  And yet, they hadn’t overpowered the defences, they’d tricked them.  It should have been impossible.

A deafening crash echoed through the building, a crash that suggested that the attackers had abandoned the subtle approach and simply decided to punch through the remaining wards.  Aylia stumbled again as more wards shattered, one hand pressing against the floor to steady herself.  She’d never felt the wards falling all at once, eve during the handful of emergency drills.  It took everything she had to reach out to reconnect to the few remaining wards, yet they were breaking as well – shattering under the impact of pure raw power.  Nothing like that had ever happened since the Serpent Wars.  Only one thing could produce that much power...

She knew she should run, but her legs felt weak and unsteady.  Somehow, she pulled herself to her feet, drawing her wand from the sleeve of her robes.  And yet, she felt completely drained of magic, as if the aftershock from the collapse of the wards had robbed her of her powers.  The reserves she had built up over the years were gone, utterly gone.  That too should have been impossible.

The doorway burst in and two figures stood there, their faces hidden behind dark cloaks.  Not that she needed to cloaks to tell that they were Dark Sorcerers; they were glowing with power, and madness.  She tried to lift her wand, yet it felt suddenly too heavy to move.  The Dark Sorcerer in the lead cast a lazy spell and her arms and legs snapped together, sending her crashing to the floor.  It was easy to counter the charm they’d used, but somehow she couldn't shape the thought it required.  Her magic seemed to have completely deserted her.

“She’s the Mistress,” one of the Dark Sorcerers confirmed.  Aylia would have blinked in surprise if she had been able to move, for the voice was unquestionably female.  A female Dark Sorcerer?  Sir Robin had reported encountering one, yet Aylia hadn't been entirely sure that she believed him.  Female magicians were rare enough, and Dark Sorcerers lived constantly on the edge.  They would hardly tolerate a woman...and yet they had.  “You need to deal with her, now.”

The second Dark Sorcerer moved forward, long clawed hands – warped by magic – emerging from the darkness of his robes.  Aylia would have cringed back if she could, or tried to shape a spell that would kill them both, but she was defenceless.  She felt cold fingers touching her forehead...and then she mentally recoiled as she felt violating fingers probing their way into her mind.  Such arts were forbidden, with very good reasons.  Her few remaining drops of power were drained into the Dark Sorcerer’s vast reserves...and then she was completely helpless.  She almost blanked out, barely aware of hands tying her hands behind her back, or of being dragged out into the great hall of Beneficence.  An hour ago, she had been the Mistress of the College – and one of the most powerful people in the world.  Now...she was nothing more than a helpless prisoner, a hostage.

***
One by one, the masters and students of Beneficence College were dragged from their dorms and dumped into the great hall.  They looked stunned; none of them had ever expected an attack right at the heart of Camelot itself.  The sheer shock would paralyse any response from the defenders of the city.  They’d see the sun rising over an occupied college...and that was just the beginning of the plan.  

Maledict chuckled to himself as he reached the heights of the towers and stared down at Camelot itself.  Once, it had been beyond his reach, but now...there was nothing outside his reach.  His grasp would encompass the city itself, and then the world...and then do what thou wilt would be the whole of the law.  The sun was starting to rise in the distance, shedding light over the gleaming towers of spires of the city.  How long would it be, he asked himself, before they realised what had happened?  And how long would it be before they realised that there was no way to dislodge him and his followers from Beneficence?

And then what would they do?

Chapter Forty

“Lady Tiffany, Lady Tiffany!”

Tiffany started awake, one hand reaching for her wand.  She’d served Merlin long enough to know that frantic alarm calls in the middle of the night – or even close to dawn – invariably meant trouble.  And with Merlin gone, the trouble could be anything from another attack by the Dark Sorcerers to an all-out invasion from the Greenwood – and Avalon.  She gripped her wand with one hand and used the other to rub the sleep from her eyes, pulling herself upright.  The frantic face of her chambermaid was staring back at her.  No one else, apart from Robin, had any access to her private chambers.

“There’s been an attack,” the chambermaid gasped.  She was middle-aged and plump, a legacy from her processor as First Councillor.  Tiffany had grown to appreciate the woman, both for her skill at cooking and for her occasionally very insightful nuggets of wisdom.  Besides, she had no need to hire someone merely for their looks, as many other Councillors had been known to do.  “They attacked the College itself!”

Tiffany opened her mind.  Instantly, she felt the shock and horror – and tendrils of dark magic – flaring through the city.  There was only one College in Camelot itself, an obvious target for the Dark Sorcerers.  She cursed her own oversight even as she staggered to her feet, heedless of her nakedness, and grabbed the robe her chambermaid held out to her.  The Dark Sorcerers were attacking Beneficence itself!  Tiffany had been a student there and she still maintained a link to the College; she could feel the violation deep within her soul.  The Dark Sorcerers had stuck at the very heart of wizardry, of organised magic.  It shouldn’t have surprised her, not really.  Wizardry was about organising magic, about making the most of what fate had given a wizard while sorcery was about expanding power.  The two only coexisted because Merlin had kept even the legitimate sorcerers in line.  And even then there had been some nasty incidents...she pushed that train of thought aside and started for the window, buckling her belt around her.  There was no time to worry about scandalising the remainder of the population.

Outside, the sun was rising over a city at war.  Smoke and flames could be seen in the direction of Beneficence, alarmingly close to the Keep.  It dawned on her that if the Dark Sorcerers wanted to make a sally into the Keep, they could eliminate the political leaders and civil servants who were holding the empire together, creating chaos.  They’d be able to take control, after a brutal civil war between Lords and Commons, with almost no opposition.  She could see fleeing students and servants in the streets, and see soldiers running from the Garrison towards Beneficence, sealing off the area.  Tiffany knew better than to think that they could deter the invaders for long.  Only magic could take on magic.

She strode out of her chambers and down into the Castellan’s rooms.  The crusty old man had already been woken by the servants and was cursing at everyone, trying to understand what was going on.  He gaped at Tiffany in her nightgown and shut up, clearly unsure of what to say.  He’d lived though five First Councillors and they had all been male.  And he’d never married.  At one point, Tiffany had thought that that was rather unusual, but she’d later come to realise that he was literally bound to the Keep itself.

“The Dark Sorcerers are in Beneficence,” she said flatly, cursing their failure of imagination.  Camelot had been immune to attack since Merlin had established the empire; the last attack had been carried out over a thousand years ago, by forces led by Arthur’s bastard son.  If they’d realised the danger, if they’d thought to have evacuation plans...and where could they go, anyway?  Every possible destination was highly political...only Camelot had been above the silent, but deadly power struggle between the Lords and the Commons.  “I want you to roust everyone out of bed, and get them down to the barracks on the east side of them.  Leave only a very basic staff here and send messengers to the clerks.  They are to head to the old school and wait for us there.”

The Castellan looked as if he wanted to say something, but Tiffany overrode him.  “Send a team of callers running through the streets, ordering everyone to stay well away from Beneficence,” she added.  “The magicians in the city are to assemble at the House of Magus; everyone else is to evacuate the area around the College.  Get the Lords and Commons heading away from Camelot...”

She finished issuing orders and strode off, confident that her orders would be obeyed.  Merlin had once told her that in a crisis, people tended to follow the voice of authority – the voice of someone who sounded as if they knew what they were doing.  And as long as they listened to Tiffany, they would believe that she knew what she was doing.  She smiled as she walked into the Privy Chamber, wishing that she knew what she was doing.  If they’d been willing to consider the possibility of Camelot itself being attacked, they might have had better plans to deal with the crisis.

As she had expected, the Privy Council was already assembling in the war room.  Messengers were running in and out of the chamber, rapidly building up a picture of what was going on along the far wall.  Someone had shown a remarkable degree of initiative for a clerk and stuck a map of the city on the wall, with a red splodge covering Beneficence.  Someone else had been industriously marking the various guard posts that were being positioned around the College, even though they would be worse than useless if the Dark Sorcerers decided to sally out.  They could use mind-twisting spells and set the men at one another’s throats.

“Report,” she ordered.  None of them, even Sorcerer Black, looked calm, or confident.  They’d been badly shocked by the attack, even though they should have expected it.  Tiffany vowed to herself, silently, that they would never underestimate the Dark Sorcerers again.  “What the hell is going on?”

It was Major General Sir Valiant, Commander of the hastily-established Camelot City Guard, who answered.  He looked as if he had aged overnight; the Garrison had normally provided what little security and policing Camelot required, but Merlin had been the ultimate guarantee of their safety.  And with so many noble armies and city guardsmen in Camelot, the whole city had become a powder keg, ready to blow.

“They’ve taken the College,” he said, flatly.  His voice was bitter, uneven.  “The first we heard of it was when our combat magicians sensed dark magic being used in Beneficence – too late to do any good.  We recovered a number of students who managed to flee the building in time, but by then they’d taken full control.  They have snipers up on the walls, blasting away at anyone who shows his face.  They’re damn” – the word slipped out without apology – “versatile, tapping into all kinds of magical levels.  I don’t dare let them see anyone, even a combat magician.”

Tiffany nodded.  Like all of the magical colleges, Beneficence’s wards had been designed to keep magic in as well as out – and the college’s own wards had helped to shield the Dark Sorcerers from detection until it had been far too late.  The wards had been impregnable – no, everyone had known that they’d been impregnable, but enough raw power could take down any ward, even one raised by the most knowledgeable wizards in the world.  Merlin would have been able to do it, but he’d been a human hybrid.  Were the Dark Sorcerers getting closer to his level?

Sorcerer Black looked just as tired.  “We need to dislodge them, quickly,” he said.  “There are...books in Beneficence that they cannot be allowed to steal.  The student textbooks alone would allow them to fill in the gaps in their knowledge.  If they managed to get some of the truly dangerous books...”

He didn't have to elaborate.  Tiffany had been at Beneficence herself, first as a student and then as Merlin’s First Councillor.  There were books that talked about summoning demons from the Unholy Trinity, the three most powerful demons who could never be summoned and never signed pacts – unless approached in precisely the right manner.  There were books that explored the forbidden levels of miscegenation, of blending human blood with that of the supernatural, and using it to produce an entire army.  Some books discussed the forbidden rites of the magician-priests of the Serpent Empire; others talked about the bloodstained rites of the Thugs, who had terrorised Hindi until they had been put down by the Knights of the Round Table.  There were keys to pacts with the Faerie, and the other creatures of Avalon; words that could be used to control angels and elemental creatures, the personifications of universal constants.  And some of the books had secrets so dark that no one, apart from Merlin, had ever dared to read them, let alone try the spells.  The Dark Sorcerers might not have known it, but they’d captured a treasure trove of knowledge.

The Major General glared at him.  “And what do you propose we do?”  He demanded.  “We could throw an entire army into the building and they’d wipe it out, instantly.”

“And they have hostages,” Lord Chancellor Rupert pointed out.  “Everyone in the building, apparently.  If we launch an attack, they may be killed in the crossfire...”

“Or slaughtered by the Dark Sorcerers,” Tiffany said, flatly.  There were rites in the forbidden tomes...if they had read some of them, they could use a mass sacrifice to make themselves effectively invincible.  She cursed her own weakness – Lady Aylia had been her friend – and then gathered herself.  It was time to start making the hard decisions.  “Can you shield an attacking force?”

“I believe so,” Sorcerer Black said.  He looked up at her, suddenly.  “Where is Sir Robin and his trusty blade?”

Tiffany’s eyes narrowed.  She hadn’t told anyone who didn't need to know about the plan, or the fact that Robin had set off to single-handedly assassinate the Duke of Tara.  And if she had known that Camelot was going to be attacked, she would never have sent him away from the city.  Did the sorcerer keep a magical eye on them, or had he merely noticed Robin’s absence and drawn the correct conclusion?

“He should be on his way back,” she said, finally.  It was true enough, although there was no way of knowing if he’d succeeded or not until he returned.  Eleanor had her own orders.  If Robin didn't show up on time, she was to fly back at once and report to Camelot.  “But we don't have time to wait for him.”

Sorcerer Black nodded.  “I’ll assemble the House of Magus – every one of them that can be relied upon,” he said.  “We will shield the garrison while the soldiers and combat magicians retake the college.  I think that that is all we can do.”

***
Maledict spoke the final word and the gateway snapped into existence.  Normally, it would be impossible to open a gateway inside the college, but with the wards so badly damaged it was easy enough to use the raw power of dark sorcery to open the link.  He nodded to the teams of bewitched students – none of them had been able to defend themselves from his spells – and they started hauling the vast collection of books from the library through the gateway.  By the time they retreated from the college – Maledict would have liked to hold it forever, but that might be impossible – they would have the true wealth of the college at their disposal.  And the secrets in those tomes would inaugurate a whole new age of magic upon the world.

He strode back towards the Great Hall and peered inside.  The tutors were still lying on the floor, unable to escape their bonds – or the network of spells he’d created to keep them still and helpless.  He caught the eye of the college’s mistress and smiled at the helpless rage written all over her face.  She’d had to watch as he’d systematically raped the minds of many of her younger students, while a handful of the older ones had been sacrificed to restore the power they’d expended in taking the building.  Not that their fates would be anything so easy; they’d be slowly drained of all of their knowledge, and then killed – and by then they would be begging for death.

Chuckling, he walked up the stairs towards the battlements.  His hatred and anger grew the more he saw of the college.  The opulence given to those born to the right bloodline, or the willingness to bow the knee to Merlin and his lapdogs – it had never been offered to him.  His old self would have sold his soul for such wealth and luxury, yet no one had seen his promise – or cared enough to make the offer.  Instead...he’d gained power as a Dark Sorcerer and he'd brought the entire empire to its knees.  He would rule over a kingdom of dark magic...

He pushed the thought aside as he stepped out into the fresh air.  He’d left a handful of sorcerers on the roof, trusting them to snipe at anything that moved with their magic.  They had quite extraordinary range and could dominate half the city, frightening people into remaining in their homes or trying to flee.  A handful of frogs, far below, showed the dangers of flight.  They’d been prosperous merchants and their families before they'd been seen running for their lives.  Now...they’d be lucky if they managed to survive, let alone be restored to human form.

“They’re shielding their soldiers, master,” one of the dark sorcerers said.  “I think they’re preparing to rush us.”

Maledict smiled.  It was the obvious tactic – and also a complete disaster waiting to happen.  There was far too much open ground between the walls of the college and Beneficence itself, ground he’d already had his followers start preparing for the coming attack.  And even if their combat magicians managed to counter those spells, what would they do when the Dark Sorcerers started blasting them from high above?

He relaxed as the minutes ticked by, peering through his Sight.  And yet, he almost didn't see it when the attack began.  A faint haze, almost invisible even to his Sight, was slowly advancing towards the west of the college.  And it was about to step on the grass...

His lips tightened into a cold smile.  Back in his hometown, the nobility had had signs warning the commoners to keep off their grass.  And now the soldiers of the Garrison were about to find out why.

***
Private Luis was shaking in his shoes as the force advanced under cover from the combat magicians – and trying very hard to hide it.  He knew just how dangerous magic could be, just from watching the duels between magicians and sorcerers who wanted to become the next High Magus.  The Garrison had walked very quietly near magicians, knowing that even the promise of retribution from Merlin was no consolation to someone who crossed the wrong magician.  Magic-users had a nasty sense of humour and the power to punish those they felt had offended them.  He knew someone who had been a man before he’d been transformed into a woman for sneering at the wrong sorcerer – and no one had been able, or willing, to turn him back into a man.

The grass smelt funny as they approached, but there was no time to hesitate.  If they reached the walls, they’d been told, they would be able to scramble up them and hit the Dark Sorcerers before they could react – if everything went according to plan.  Somehow, Luis suspected that everything wouldn't go to plan; even in the Garrison, there were officers more intent on looking good than caring about the lives of their men.  The leading man put one foot on the grass, and then another.  And then all hell broke loose.

To Luis’s eyes, the grass suddenly came to life and reared up in front of them.  He saw teeth, formed from stones, glittering in the sunlight as the grassy monster roared towards them.  The ground under his feet quaked and he found himself falling over backwards, hitting the ground hard enough to hurt.  But he'd been on the grass, he thought numbly, and then the grass rose up around him.  There was a sudden flicker of light through the air and the haze the combat magicians had been projecting was torn away, leaving them revealed to the world.  He saw a figure standing on the battlements, waving a finger down towards the remaining advance...and then the world went away in the flash of blinding green light.

***
Tiffany watched in horror as the assault plan came apart.  Two hundred magicians and over a thousand soldiers had been committed to the assault, but somehow the Dark Sorcerers had seen through the haze.  Even the most powerful combat magicians couldn't hold them back for long, not even long enough to retreat.  Bodies were stacked up like cordwood, torn apart by the monsters the Dark Sorcerers had created or simply shredded by their own magic.  The remaining survivors managed to retreat, some badly wounded.  As far as she could tell, none of the Dark Sorcerers had even been threatened, let alone killed.

And they held Beneficence.  They could destroy the remains of the government...

For the first time in her life, even after the terrible moments when she’d realised that Merlin was gone and the Iron Palace was crashing down without his will holding it up, she felt despair.  The Empire was finished.  Everything Merlin had built would become the plaything of the Dark Sorcerers.  Merlin’s golden age was over.

And so was she.

Chapter Forty-One

“What the hell?”

Robin saw the smoke rising from Camelot as the dragon started to descend towards the Keep.  Camelot, like all cities, had thousands of stoves burning wood and coal, but this was different.  A great plume of black smoke was rising from the Iron Triangle and his Sight revealed flashes of dark magic infesting the city, terrorising the population.  The streets seemed almost deserted; as he peered down towards the College, he could see bodies lying on the ground.  There seemed to be only a handful of defenders left alive.

“Get us down, quickly,” he ordered.  He touched Excalibur’s hilt, drawing energy from the sword.  Assassinating Duke Blackrock and his wife – and kidnapping his daughter – had left him tired, but if the Dark Sorcerers were attacking Camelot…it crossed his mind that they could be flying right into a trap, but Tiffany was down there somewhere.  He wasn't going to abandon her, even if he had to fight his way through the entire force of Dark Sorcerers.  “Now, damn it!”

The dragon swooped low over the city and descended to the ground in front of the Houses of Parliament.  Robin could smell smoke – and blood – in the air as the dragon slowed to a hover, mighty wings beating the air, and slowly landed on the ground.  A handful of soldiers appeared from out of nowhere, swords, spears and rifles at the ready, before they recognised him and started to cheer.  Robin, on impulse, drew Excalibur and held the glowing sword aloft, even though he was worried at how dependent they’d become on the legendary weapon.  He had a hunch – which the sword would neither confirm nor deny – that Excalibur’s powers had their limits…and so did its willingness to help.  They would have to stand on their own two feet before they were worthy of taking Merlin’s place.

He slid off the dragon and bade Eleanor wait for him, with the two girls, before he strode over to the soldiers, who were keeping a respectful distance from the dragon.  The leader – a sergeant, wearing badges that didn’t match his men’s badges – rapidly briefed him on what was going on; the city had been attacked and the Dark Sorcerers were holding Beneficence College, along with hundreds of hostages.  An unknown number of guardsmen and combat magicians had been slaughtered in a futile attempt to retake the building.  And now the entire city was slowly being evacuated.

“Take me to the First Councillor,” Robin ordered, finally.  He had to see Tiffany – and if she was one of the hostages, nothing would stop him from cutting his way through the defences and to her side.  “Leave the dragon here; Eleanor can take care of the guards.”

The Keep seemed undamaged, but the soldiers and combat magicians gathered near the vast blocky building were careful to keep out of direct line of sight from the occupied college.  Robin, who had had to take down rogue magical snipers in his time, understood perfectly.  A single sniper could dominate the entire city, at least until a team of wizards could deal with him – either directly or through shielding guardsmen who would kill the sniper before he could take them out.  The Privy Council had ordered the evacuation of the building, as Robin had expected, but they’d refused to evacuate themselves.  Robin wasn't sure if that was sound politics or foolish bravado; the Keep was heavily warded against attack, yet that had also been true of Beneficence.  

Excalibur glowed in his hand as they entered the building and walked down deserted corridors.  The whole scene reminded him alarmingly of the abandoned buildings in Kentigern, deserted for hundreds of years and tainted by dark sorcery and wild magic.  If half of the stories of what was stored in Beneficence were true, the Dark Sorcerers would be able to make what had happened to Kentigern look no more significant than a minor bruise.  He shivered at the thought; given enough time, they could unleash demons that would ransack the entire world – and without Merlin, they might never be banished back to Hell.  Even Excalibur had its limits…

Tiffany was seated with Major General Valiant and Sorcerer Black when he entered – and she looked crushed.  Robin felt his heart go out to her, even as she came to her feet and ran towards him, nearly impaling herself on Excalibur as she grabbed him and held him tightly.  The other two were more restrained in their greetings, although they seemed more relieved to see Excalibur than Robin himself.  Without the Armoury, there were only a handful of magical weapons in the city – and none of them could match Excalibur.  Merlin had always kept the most dangerous ones safely locked up, and now they were gone.

“Duke Blackrock and his wife are dead,” Robin said, once he could breathe again.  It was odd how his armour reacted to her touch, almost allowing her to hug him to death.  “His daughter is outside, a prisoner.  What happened here?”

Tiffany explained, quickly and concisely.  Much of it Robin already knew, but some of the details, including the identities of some of the hostages, were new to him.  The loss of the College’s teachers was alarming, if only because they would have intimate knowledge of most of the newly-graduated wizards and sorcerers.  In the wrong hands, that kind of knowledge could prove immensely destructive.  And the attack the Tribunal and the Garrison had launched to attempt to recover the College had been a complete disaster.  Hundreds of soldiers and combat magicians had been slaughtered.

Robin looked over at Sorcerer Black when Tiffany had finished.  “Could you teleport me in there?”

The sorcerer looked thoughtful for a long moment.  “It would be chancy,” he admitted, finally.  “They took down all the protective wards, but if they think to re-establish them…”

“They won’t,” Robin said, confidently.  The Dark Sorcerers used teleport spells to escape when they were cornered and unless they believed they could hold Beneficence indefinitely, they wouldn't risk cutting off their own line of retreat.  Perhaps it was possible to selectively block teleport spells, but no Dark Sorcerer Robin had ever encountered would risk his life to test the theory.  It would cost him his life if it failed.  “And once I’m inside…”

He brandished Excalibur.  “I’ll get to their leaders, free the hostages and slaughter the bastards,” he said.  Much of his confidence was pretence, but they needed to see him confident.  Tiffany was on the verge of collapse and none of the others were much better.  “And then we can recover all the books and documents at leisure.”

“I hate to rain on your parade,” Sorcerer Black said, “but they will have sensed your return to Camelot.  They will certainly have sensed Excalibur.  As soon as you materialise inside the building, they will turn it against you…and that sword doesn’t make you invincible.  They captured you before; this time, they will simply kill you out of hand.”

“True,” Robin agreed.  A plan was slowly unfolding itself in his mind.  “Could you and your fellow magicians create a false impression of Excalibur’s whereabouts?”

Sorcerer Black stroked his chin, thoughtfully.  “Maybe,” he said, carefully.  “If we were to combine it with a masking spell, they’d pick up bits and pieces and think that we were trying to hide the sword’s exact position.  But that won’t work as long as Excalibur itself is nearby.  They won’t be fooled if they see the sword in two places at the same time…”

“I put Excalibur in a pocket dimension,” Robin said.  He couldn’t create one – that required a wizard with proper training – but he could open one, if he was given the correct words of power.  “They don’t sense the blade until I produce it from the pocket dimension…”

“And if they catch you without it in your hand, they will kill you,” Tiffany protested.  Robin could see her working up to forbidding the entire scheme, but there really was no other choice, short of using the dragons to burn the College to the ground.  And even then the Dark Sorcerers could teleport away.  “Robin, my love, you can’t…”

“There’s no other choice,” Robin said.  He tapped his armour, feeling the crest that had been burnt into the armour when he’d been knighted.  A Knight of the Round Table would go anywhere, bear any burden and face any foe, to protect the population of the empire.  As long as it wasn't quite suicide – and even if it was, if there was a reasonable chance of success – a Knight went in.  “I could not love thee half so much, if I did not love honour more…”

“I’ll go make the preparations,” Sorcerer Black said, hastily.  Robin realised that he didn’t want to be caught in the middle of a lover’s quarrel.  That was…odd; no matter how much he considered it, he couldn’t see the Master of the Tribunal’s decision to enter the limelight as anything, but a very bad sign.  “We’ll have the fake sword prepared for activation within an hour…”

“There is another possibility,” Major General Valiant said, reluctantly.  “You could release the loyal sorcerers from the Laws of Magus…”

“No,” Tiffany said, flatly.  The more power a sorcerer channelled, the greater the chance of madness – or dark sorcery.  Releasing the sorcerers from the bonds of Merlin’s Laws of Magus would turn the loyal sorcerers into maddened enemies of order, even those who had no intention of ever becoming Dark Sorcerers.  And that didn’t include the demons they might call up and release from Hell, or any number of other dark acts they might commit in their madness.  “I will not countenance that; not now, not ever.”

“Besides,” Sorcerer Black said, too quickly.  “Who could we sacrifice?”

Robin knew the answer the Dark Sorcerers would give – and even many of the nobles.  There were thousands of commoners in Camelot…and all of them were regarded as worthless by most of their lords and masters.  It was easy to imagine some of the Dukes deciding to slaughter peasants in their thousands just to boost their power…and Dark Sorcerers, intent on gaining as much power as they could as quickly as possible, wouldn't hesitate to sacrifice entire towns, even cities.  The horrors of the Serpent Wars had never been forgotten.  They provided a warning of what the world might look like, if the Dark Sorcerers reigned supreme.

The two left the chamber quickly, leaving Robin and Tiffany alone.  “I don’t want you to risk it,” Tiffany admitted.  Robin held her, feeling her shaking against him.  She’d survived the attack on their wedding day and even the destruction inflicted on an innocent city, but something had drained the life out of her.  Perhaps it was the fall of Beneficence, her former school, or the capture of one of her best friends.  Or perhaps she’d finally reached the end of her tether.  “I…”

Robin pulled her close to him, kissing her tears away.  “I will come back to you,” he promised, although he wasn't sure if it was a promise he could keep.  The Dark Sorcerers might deflect the teleport spell, or they might do something far worse…and they might recover Excalibur.  Robin had no doubt that they would never be able to unlock the secrets within the sword, but Excalibur in enemy hands would be a shattering boost for their morale.  “You promised me a long honeymoon somewhere warm.”

Tiffany giggled, despite her tears.  They’d planned on a honeymoon, but that had been before Merlin had departed and they’d found themselves coping with crisis after crisis.  She'd told him that she intended to take him to Shallot and introduce him to her family, but they hadn’t even had the time to do that.  And neither of them believed that they would have a chance to relax in the very near future, or even for a very long time.

Her red hair smelled so sweet that he didn’t want to let go of her, but there was no choice.  “I’ll come back,” he promised, and tried not to think about the odds.  Excalibur was a constant presence at his side, but without it…he reminded himself firmly that he’d escaped the Dark Sorcerers without Excalibur, recovering the sword before they could damage it beyond repair.  “And then…I want to take you somewhere.”

He briefly explained about Granny and her offer to teach Tiffany what she knew.  Robin had been in two minds about mentioning her at all, but Tiffany had a right to know – and besides, she had a much better nose for political intrigue.  Witchcraft had been banned by Merlin, yet Tiffany would know if there was a good reason behind the ban, or if Merlin was so intent on introducing wizardry that he’d banned all other forms of magic and never rescinded the ban.

“We can go together,” Tiffany said, finally.  She gave him one final hug and then let go of him, turning away so that he would not see her tears.  “Now go – and may God be with you.”

***
A cold air was blowing through the city, tainted by the omnipresent mixture of smoke and blood, when Robin stepped out of the Keep and walked over to the House of Magus.  A number of the most powerful magicians in the world, excepting those who practiced dark sorcery, were gathered on the lawn, building a doll in armour.  Sorcerer Black held up a black blade from an enchanter’s shop and nodded to him, waving Robin over to stand beside him.

“I’ll open the pocket dimension and anchor it to you,” he promised, as a pair of enchanters went to work on the black sword.  It looked to have been made out of coal, reminding Robin of the Dread Diamond Blade of Shetland, a story he’d been told in his youth.  The blade had made its wieldier invincible until it had been struck with an almighty burst of lightning and turned to coal.  “And then we will create the false sword…”

Robin held up Excalibur and, at his command, let the sword fall out of the world.  The pocket dimensions had always given him headaches – it looked as if the sword had fallen into nothingness - but this one seemed to be perfect.  Sorcerer Black attached it to a talisman and passed it to Robin, which he hung around his neck.  It would serve as the key for unlocking the pocket dimension and freeing Excalibur from imprisonment.  And the moment he opened the dimension, they’d know that he was inside the building.  And then all hell would break loose.

“We think we can put you into the underground basement,” Sorcerer Black said.  A team of sorcerers were already chanting the preliminary spells.  Robin would have all the protections they could weave into the spell, but he knew that they might be futile.  If the Dark Sorcerers had set up wards…there was no way to know.  Anyone who tried to peer at Beneficence though Sight found that it was impossible, like staring into a blinding light.  “After that…you’ll be on your own.”

“I understand,” Robin said.  He’d gone into Castle Blackrock alone, after all…but then, he had had Excalibur with him.  This would be different.  “Once you sense me unleashing the sword, hit the building with everything you have.  Don’t hold anything back.”

“Of course,” Sorcerer Black agreed.  He tapped Robin lightly on the shoulder, an odd parody of the greeting mounting knights exchanged while on horseback.  “Are you ready?”

Robin nodded.  A moment later, the sorcerers started to chant loudly…and the world faded away into green light.  For a horrifying second, perhaps not even that, Robin felt suspended within the teleport, as if the spell had ground to a halt, leaving him trapped as less than a ghost.  And then the world seemed to slam back into existence around him and he found himself in the basement, staggering as if he'd been punched in the belly.  He swallowed hard to keep down the bile threatening to rise up and spew out of his mouth, feeling the room shifting around him.  Slowly, alarmingly slowly, it started to calm down.

He bit down a curse as he steadied himself, and then reached into his belt and removed two pistols.  They both held a mixture of silver and iron bullets, half blessed and half cursed.  He’d used them for hunting rogue werewolves and vampires in the past, but now they could suffice against Dark Sorcerers, provided that he caught them unawares.  If they had no time to protect themselves, he might be able to kill them without drawing Excalibur.  He touched the talisman and started to creep towards the door, allowing his armour to boost his strength and steady him.  No Knight liked to depend upon the charms woven into the armour, but he had no choice.

The basement door was locked, unsurprisingly, but Robin picked it with relative ease.  When it clicked open, the metal seemed to flow like water and formed a face, a grinning demon with very sharp teeth.  It stared at him for a moment as Robin prepared to jump backwards, before it melted completely away and ran down the door and pooled on the floor.  Robin realised slowly that the door must have had a protective sprite, but the sprite’s bonds had almost been broken when Beneficence’s wards had gone down.  And now it was free, probably winging its way back to the Darkness.  A demon would have run amok before it escaped or was banished back to Hell.

He stepped out into the corridor and froze as he saw a small group of students walking towards him.  Their eyes were dull and lifeless and they marched as if they were under someone else’s control.  He braced himself for a fight, but they walked past him without reacting to him at all.  Control spells had their limits, he reminded himself, and whoever had enthralled them hadn’t had time to program them properly.  Silently vowing that he would do whatever it took to stop the madness, he started to walk up towards the stairs...and stopped.

Something was brewing in the air, something nasty.  He could feel it, something looming right on the edge of his perception…something very unpleasant.  And the stench reminded him of Kentigern…

Cursing, Robin began to run.  Whatever they were doing up there – and he had a pretty shrewd idea - he had to stop it quickly, before time ran out for good.  And all of Camelot was at stake.

Chapter Forty-Two

“On your feet, bitch.”

Aylia could barely move.  One of the Dark Sorcerers – thankfully not one of her enslaved students – reached out and impatiently pulled her to her feet.  She tried to shape a thought in her mind that should have turned him into a toad, but the spells binding her and her powers held firm.  They’d been designed for sorcerers with more raw power than they knew how to deal with and Aylia, for all of her knowledge and skill, was no sorcerer.  The network of spells held her firmly in her place.

The Dark Sorcerer caught her arm and manhandled her along the corridors that, a day before, she’d ruled.  Bloodstains were everywhere, marking where her students had fallen – or had been killed, merely for the hell of it.  The shimmer of magic that had once been an omnipresent part of the building was gone.  She would have cried, if she had dared to show weakness.  The legacy of nearly a thousand years of research into wizardry – the safe way to learn magic – was gone.  He bustled her into the library and she stopped, almost stumbling over when she saw the desecration.  Thousands of common books, mass-produced by the printing presses developed by the free cities, had been ruthlessly dumped on the floor, while the rare and valuable books were transported through a gateway by enslaved students.  She started to struggle against her bonds, rage giving her a strength beyond anything she’d felt as a free woman, but it was of no avail.  Her captor jammed a wand into her back and her entire body convulsed with pain.  It took everything she had to keep a scream from escaping her mouth.  

“Take her through,” another Dark Sorcerer ordered.  Aylia felt cold horror as she saw his face, warped and twisted by dark magic.  The flesh was literally burning off his skull, threatening to turn him into a lich, a dead body animated by a sorcerer’s will.  There were tales about such creatures in the past, sorcerers who had survived both the ravages of sorcery and the madness it brought in its wake, only to become less than human, creatures of pure power.  A lich could be extremely dangerous if it had a will of its own, rather than a zombie.  But then, a zombie horde would be just as dangerous, given the opportunity.

She was surprised by how calm and analytical she felt, even though her world had turned upside down.  The disfigured Dark Sorcerer saw her looking at him and stared back, red light shining deep within his eyes.  She wasn’t even sure if he had eyes any longer, as if nothing more than raw magic allowed him to see.  And if he was that far gone, there would never be any hope of reasoning with him.  He would have to be destroyed, yet with such an infusion of magic, very little could hope to destroy him.

It was tempting to open her mouth, to try to challenge him and provoke him into a magical act that might destroy what little was left of his physical existence, but she didn’t quite dare.  Part of her believed that she might still survive, that she might find a way to escape, even though her magic was blocked and her hands were tied so tightly that her wrists had gone numb.  Her captor pushed her forward, into the shimmering curtain of light, and Beneficence vanished behind her.  They’d kidnapped her from her College.  There truly was nothing sacred left in the world.

She opened her eyes, unaware that she’d closed them, and saw a grey stone chamber – and a handful of her former subordinates.  They were tied and bound, just like her; their shocked faces showing her their shame and horror at having been captured so easily.  Aylia couldn’t understand, at first, why the Dark Sorcerers had bothered to take so many; she could be ransomed, as could some of the other aristocratic teachers, but the common-born would bring them no ransom.  And then it struck her.  Few Dark Sorcerers had any formal training; after all, one of the benefits of formal training was that it discouraged young wizards from trying to become sorcerers, certainly by any of the rather unsafe methods used by the Dark Sorcerers.  Surely, any Dark Sorcerer, looking at the opportunities opened up by Merlin’s departure, would want to complete their magical education…

…And Aylia and her staff had been training young wizards for decades.

If she could have killed herself, she would have done.  But the spells binding her also prevented her from shaping the thought that would kill her.  All wizards learned how to destroy themselves, if only to prevent magical disasters that would destroy their lives, yet the knowledge was of no avail.  She could not escape into death…and she knew that, given time, the Dark Sorcerers would make slaves out of them all.  And then the enemies of all of civilisation would become vastly more dangerous.

She thought desperately, calling upon all of her reserves of knowledge, but there seemed to be no escape.  There was no hope at all.

***
Maledict cocked his head as he sensed, for the first time since the raid had begun, the presence of Excalibur.  There was no hiding such an Object of Power – and, after he’d had the blade in his presence, there was no mistaking it for anything else.  He couldn't imagine why they’d not used the blade in their first attack on Beneficence, but it hardly mattered.  Perhaps they’d had to wake the cursed Knight of the Round Table from sleep.  The thought amused him and he cackled, ignoring the looks from the handful of remaining college staff.  They were too late.  Excalibur would hardly matter.

He reached out with his mind and sensed the bottomless reserves of power they’d collected.  They’d separated the older students from the younger ones – the innocent souls from those who might have made questionable bargains in their time – and sacrificed the younger ones to gain power.  Now, they had enough power to perform almost any rite.  He’d issued the orders to begin preparations as soon as the building itself was in their hands and Faye, loyal Faye, had completed her work.  The time was almost right.

Maledict turned and walked through the bloodstained corridors, enjoying the vision of wreaked hallways and shattered artworks, all built on the sweat of the lower orders.  A handful of Dark Sorcerers were amusing themselves with the handful of female students, draining their powers and ravishing their minds; he allowed them to do it, knowing that permitting such acts bound them all the more closely to himself.  They would never be accepted by the remains of Merlin’s government, not any longer.  There would be no place to hide if they betrayed him…

He allowed his mind to roam, caressing the ball of power they held securely within their wards.  To touch it too closely would be like flying straight into the sun; the burst of uncontrolled magic would shatter anyone who dared to tap it without proper precautions.  The thought made him smile, coldly.  Faye’s basic grounding in magical theory had allowed her to teach him how to channel such power, even though it had to be at one remove.  And now her usefulness had come to an end.  Her former tutors would be much more helpful – and, controlled as they were, they could never pose a threat to him.

Maledict had no doubt that Faye had realised the truth, the truth that he had only grasped dimly in the days following the death of the High Magus.  An ambitious person – and all sorcerers were ambitious and power-hungry – would see the opportunity to overthrow her master without needing to match his power, if she understood what she was doing.  No, her presence was a risk he no longer needed to tolerate.  He could only remain in control by cowing the other Dark Sorcerers and he could only do that by being unquestionably the most powerful of them all.

The chamber he stepped into had once taught the basics of magical duelling and had crawled with spells intended to ensure the safety of the students.  It was a dark dank room, without any chairs or tables, merely a single restraining circle drawn on the floor.  The only light came from a globe Faye had summoned and cast into the air, shedding an eerie flickering light over the entire scene.  Faye herself was standing near the circle, half-covered in blood.  She’d used a mixture of Dragon’s Blood – one of the most powerfully magical substances known to man – and her own blood to construct the spell.  She hadn’t realised – yet – that she would be honoured by the chance to grasp and control more power than any sorcerer could hope to control…and by the time she realised the truth, it would be far too late.

Faye dropped to her knees as she saw him approach.  He wasn't fooled by her submission; he could see, he was sure, the calculation hidden behind her expressionless face.  And who could blame her for wanting to overthrow him?  He studied her scarred face and gnarled hands and wondered, absently, if there was any way to avoid the damage, both morally and physically, that dark sorcery inflicted on the human body and soul.  It had been a long time since he’d been interested in taking a woman for himself, even though he could have used his powers to bend any woman to his will.  Part of him missed the sexual impulse; part of him knew that sex, no matter how warped the desire and submissive the woman, was no match for the attraction of raw power.

“Master,” she said.  He could hear…something in her voice, a sense that she might finally have enough power to overthrow him.  She’d constructed far more incriminate wards around herself than any other Dark Sorcerer, even the handful of others who had some formal training.  “The circle is complete.”

Maledict smiled.  “You have done well,” he said.  Raw power crackled around his fingertips as he touched her forehead, feeling her wards resisting his touch.  He half-expected her to strike then, but she didn’t move, even though his fingers were touching her bare flesh.  It would have been easy to crush her in that moment, yet he held himself back.  There was a further pleasure to come.  “You will have the honour of beginning the rite.”

Faye stared at him, utterly surprised.  She had no doubt assumed that Maledict, no fool, would refuse to allow anyone else the chance to channel the power.  After all, if someone did master the vast store of power, it could swat Maledict like a bug.

“Master,” she said, finally.  “I am honoured…”

Maledict stepped back from her and smiled again.  “You may begin the rite,” he informed her.  “The time is right.”

He cast his awareness out again, seeing through the crumbling walls of Beneficence and out into the surrounding streets.  The forces of Merlin’s government, what was left of them, were gathering, preparing to attempt to evict the Dark Sorcerers from the College.  He could sense Excalibur – and a handful of other Objects of Power – being arrayed against him, with hundreds of sorcerers and wizards adding their power to the preparations.  They had dragons flying nearby, twisting through the air as they awaited the command to unleash their hellish breath upon the enemy.  This time, there would be no mistakes.

Except one, he thought, and cackled.  They were far too late.

He summoned one of his enslaved students – a young boy who had dared to raise his wand against a Dark Sorcerer and had been horrifically disfigured for his pains – and sent him to tell the others to step through the gateway and escape.  There was so much dark sorcery running through the building that even the most subtle of wizards, peering through their Sight, would be unable to discern that most of their intended prey had already fled.  Their morale would crash in the wake of this latest catastrophe – and his final parting shot, the destruction of the heart of Merlin’s government.

Faye was standing in the circle, having divested herself of all clothing.  There was great symbolism in nakedness, Maledict knew; there would be nothing standing between her and the power – and the network of wards she’d constructed to channel the power to its intended target.  Her body was scarred by her pursuit of power – and scars inflicted by her tormentors, long before she’d fled the building she was about to destroy – but she held herself proudly, refusing to show weakness.  It would have been a fatal mistake.

And all of the Dark Sorcerers, save two, were gone.

“Begin,” he ordered.

Faye dropped to her knees, spreading her thighs wide.  She placed her hands behind her neck, offering herself in a gesture of primal submission.  The Darkness would be pleased.  Slowly, she began to chant, each Word of Power echoing on the air.  Maledict sensed a dull rumbling in the distance as the power started shimmering out into the Darkness, shaping a single all-consuming thought.  A summons…

He stepped backwards as space and time began to distort around her.  Something – Someone – had heard.  And He was coming.  His presence was already pressing against the mortal world, his voice whispering words in a long-forgotten tongue as He emerged from the Darkness into the fragile mortal world.  Maledict laughed as he felt the entity’s presence pressing down on him.  The last time such an entity had been summoned, a city had died.  Now…how many would die before it was banished back to the Darkness?

“Stop!”

Maledict turned to see a Knight of the Round Table, wearing that hated armour, standing on the other side of the chamber.  The Knight’s face was hidden behind the white-gold helm, but he was mortally certain that it was the same Knight who he’d captured, only to have escape and reveal the location of his lair to the forces of law and order.  He drew a set of pistols and levelled them at Faye, yet it was far too late.

“Stop now,” the Knight bellowed.  His voice sounded puny in the chamber, drowned out by the whispering of the dread entity.  It was moving closer; soon, even the mundane population would be able to sense it.  Everyone with even the slightest hint of magical ability for miles around would already know what was going on.  “Stop or I fire!”

Maledict produced his wand and laughed aloud.  “It’s too late, Sir Robin,” he said.  Magic amplified his voice, echoing out in the chamber.  “Run away, Sir Robin; run away!”

And he laughed.

***
Robin ignored the Dark Sorcerer as best as he could, trying to level his pistols at the naked women in the circle.  The entire room was glowing, illuminated by a blinding light that seemed to come from nowhere.  If the woman could hear him, she gave no sign; her eyes were tightly closed against something only she could see.  It wouldn’t be long, he realised numbly, before the presence manifested and everyone could behind it in all its dark and terrifying glory.  What had the Dark Sorcerers summoned up from the Darkness?

He levelled his pistols, squinting against the blinding light, and opened fire.  The weapons clicked uselessly, before falling to dust.  Robin realised, as he grabbed the talisman and tried to open the pocket dimension, that whatever was slowly materialising around them was already affecting events in the mundane mortal world.  The pocket dimension was still there, yet it refused to open.  Excalibur was beyond his reach.

Robin produced one of his charmed daggers and looked up for the Dark Sorcerer who led the pack, but he was gone.  The sense of power was growing ever stronger, ever darker; it wouldn't be long now.  He threw one of the daggers right at the woman, but it couldn’t cross the circle, for all the charms and runes he’d carved into it when it had been produced at the Garrison.  With an almighty effort, he stepped forward and froze.  No matter how much he tried to move his body, it just refused to advance any further.  He couldn’t move…

And then it was far too late.

***
He’d tricked her, Faye realised.  Her master had decided to dispose of her.  The power she’d unleashed was flaring around her, infusing itself into her very soul.  She kept her eyes squeezed tightly closed, fearing what she would see if she opened them, even as she desperately prayed to a God she’d refused to worship.  Shaking, feeling the entity’s touch prowling through her mind, she tried to stop the ritual.  It didn’t work.  Something was so deeply infused into her, now, that she was nothing more than its puppet.  Her body did as it was commanded by the will of her new master.

She could hear words, right on the edge of comprehension, as she lifted her voice in the final chant.  Nothing she did worked.  Her body had become completely divorced from her mind.  Oddly, she felt her fear ebbing away.  The power grew stronger and…

Faye’s eyes snapped open.  There was a moment when she stared right at the entity – no, it was all around her, consuming her – and then her eyeballs burst in their sockets.  Red pain ran down her nerves and into her mind, leaving her sanity burnt away, followed rapidly by her soul.  The last thing she heard was an awful voice, thundering all around her.

“FREE,” it thundered.  It hammered into what was left of her mind, the words reshaping reality to its will.  She was nothing compared to its sheer immensity and power, just a moth flying through the flame.  The entire building was shaking around her, or so she thought.  It was so hard to think as the last of her awareness ebbed away into nothingness.  The voice mocked her and taunted her, thanking her even as it damned her to eternal fire.  “FREE AT LAST!”

And then there was nothing.  Nothing at all.

Chapter Forty-Three

The wave of demonic power sent Tiffany falling to her knees.  All around her, everyone with the slightest hint of magical sensitivity was staggering backwards, recoiling from the sheer intensity of the demon’s presence.  She could hear its words echoing through her head, each thought laden with chilling malice and an evil that was shockingly primal in its intensity.  The demon was the worst that could exist on the mortal plane, she realised; it was pure evil.  Perhaps it didn’t have free will as humans understood the term – although the fallen angels who had been thrown down from Heaven had chosen to follow Lucifer in his bid for supreme power – but that hardly mattered.  Its mere presence was immensely destructive.

Beneficence College started to warp, twisting out of shape, as the demon’s power grew stronger.  It was pushing the mortal world aside so it could manifest fully, placing immense stress on reality.  There was a thunderous crash as part of the College, unable to take the stress, simply exploded, sending debris crashing down all over the city.  On any other day, it would have been a disaster beyond imagining, but now…it was only the beginning.  The sense of raw power heightened as the demon’s influence continued to spread, and finally slipped into manifestation.  Tiffany felt sheer terror, rooting her to the spot; if she had been able to move, she would have fled.  Her legs refused to obey her increasingly frantic commands to flee.  The demon terrified her at a very basic level.  Nothing human could hope to destroy it.

The demon slowly began to manifest, towering up above where the College had once stood.  It’s mere presence distorted reality; Tiffany saw the remains of the College distorting around the demon’s feet, as if it was somehow more real than mortal flesh and blood.  It seemed to be thousands of miles high, yet she could see it in terrifying detail.  The demon was imprinting itself on the surrounding world.  Her mouth fell open, but words refused to form.  Every spell, ward and charm she’d been taught fled from her mind.

It was huge, bright red in colour, with dark hair covering its groin.  A dark beard framed its face, with hellish rotting teeth and flames licking around its mouth.  Bright yellow eyes, a sickly hue, seemed to shine from high above, allowing it to peer deep into her soul.  She met its eyes for a split-second and almost vomited as her mind touched the sheer evil that pervaded the demon.  It lifted its massive arms – which ended in claws – to the sky, and then bent down to peer at the humans.  A giant might have peered with such apparent curiosity, but even the legendary Two Stone Giants of Tara could never have displayed the chilling indifferent menace of the demon.  No, Tiffany realised; it wasn't indifferent.  This was a creature that delighted in death and suffering, in making the human race pay for its sins.  It had never been an angel, even before the Fall of Lucifer.  It was a creature of pure evil.

Tiffany found that she could move again, as if she had somehow grown accustomed to the demon’s presence.  Direct contact with a demon in its native form – insofar as the term had any meaning – would literally destroy her mind, yet the demon was manifesting in a form human minds could accept, if not comprehend.  It suggested to her that the powers of evil were still under some form of restraint, but she couldn’t understand what might be holding back the demon from simply wishing them all out of existence.  And then it struck her.  The demon would never be satisfied simply by destroying them all.  It wanted them to suffer, to know that there was no hope – to despair.  Oddly, the thought gave her courage.  If it needed them to despair, it was very far from all-powerful…

The demon opened its mouth.  A hellish stench of fire and brimstone billowed out across the city, causing thousands of people to choke and gasp for fresh air.  Tiffany murmured a charm that should have protected her from the demon’s vile breath, but the charm was almost completely ineffective.  The demon’s eyes crossed the city, its amused mental chuckle – echoing in her mind – showed its contempt.  There were over ten thousand armed men – city guardsmen, aristocratic soldiers and Garrison troopers – and nearly a thousand sorcerers and wizards…and Tiffany knew with a sick certainty that they wouldn't be enough.  The entire force would be able to do little more than delay the demon, perhaps annoy it.  They couldn’t hope to stop it indefinitely.

Its eyes met those of the dragons, orbiting the edge of the city.  The dragons yelped and several of them turned to flee, panicking so much that their riders were thrown off their backs and sent tumbling down to the ground, far below.  None of them survived their fall.  Tiffany had never seen anything frighten a dragon before and she would have been grateful not to discover that something, anything, could force a dragon to flee.  Merlin’s sole control of dragon-riders had been one of his advantages when he’d been establishing his empire; dragons were powerful in their own right, and twinned with a skilful rider they could decide the course of entire battles.  Now…they fled the battlefield, before the fight had even begun.  

The demon laughed aloud and casually swept out a hand.  It crashed through a set of aristocratic mansions, smashing the buildings as if they had been made of paper.  Tiffany heard the twang as archers unleashed their arrows – and shots as riflemen opened fire – but the demon seemed unperturbed by the attack.  If anything, it was amused; it seemed to be growing bigger, even though she could see no sign of increased mass.  It bent down to peer at the archers and whisper words that sounded like breaking glass, or breaking hearts.  The archers caught fire and burned to death in seconds, the sounds of their dying magnified until they echoed over the entire city.

Sorcerer Black had somehow managed to find his feet and was bellowing orders to his subordinates – and every other sorcerer in the vicinity.  Right now, Tiffany would have thanked the Dark Sorcerers if they had joined the defence, although she knew that that would never happen.  Or perhaps they would have changed their tune if they’d come face to face with a creature from the hellfire.  She gladly added what was left of her magic to the shimmering banishment ward Sorcerer Black was trying desperately to form – for once, all of the sorcerers were cooperating, without trying to jostle for position – but she knew that it wouldn't be enough.  The demon laughed and stared at the ward as it shimmered into existence and it shattered, leaving the magicians drained.  A handful collapsed on the ground, rolling about in agony as their magic failed and old age finally caught up with them.  Tiffany saw one young sorcerer, a handsome young man who had set hearts a-fluttering at Court, age within seconds, all of his years catching up with him at once.  By the time he finally expired, he looked older than Merlin, old enough to be her great-grandfather.

The demon lashed out again.  This time, its hand swept through the ranks of massed soldiers, slaughtering them with random strokes that were somehow more terrifying than direct malice.  Hundreds of soldiers caught fire as they touched its hand, their burning bodies tossed through the air to come down all over the city.  Merlin had protected his city from fire, Tiffany remembered numbly; now, fire was a very real threat.  What remained of the population might be burned out of house and home.  Hundreds of soldiers were still trying to fight, but others were fleeing, their minds destroyed from being so close to the demon.  Others were trying to pray aloud, only to discover that the words seemed to mean nothing to the monster.  It held out one long hand and a bolt of shimmering blue lightning cracked down and struck the Stave Church.  The church caught fire and rapidly turned into a towering inferno.  No one seemed to escape before the roof fell in, killing anyone who remained within the building.

Flames spread up as the demon slowly started to move.  Almost absently, it kicked out and an aristocratic mansion – one belonging to the Duke of Tara, now abandoned – was smashed, as casually as a child might destroy a sandcastle.  Another building followed, and then another, the demon stamping down with casual brutality.  Tiffany found her eyes following the monster as it swept up a dozen men and women and held them high, before dropping them into its gaping mouth.  She heard their screams before they died, crushed by its huge teeth.  There were stories about a Knight of the Round Table who had been swallowed by a giant, only to cut his way out of the giant’s stomach.  Somehow, she doubted that anyone would be able to free themselves from the demon.  For all she knew, the demon had trapped them, body and soul.

She touched her wedding ring, suddenly aware that it was still warm.  The demon had mesmerised her so strongly that she hadn’t even thought of Robin, and Excalibur.  If there was any weapon on Earth that could challenge the demon, it was Excalibur – and yet, where was Robin?  Had he been trapped within the rubble…or had he been sucked into Hell?  

Oh Robin, she thought, focusing all of her remaining power on the ring, where are you?

***
Robin had the unpleasant sensation that he’d blacked out without quite realising that anything had happened.  His entire body hurt and his awareness of where he was seemed to have been shattered.  There had been a ritual…and the female dark Sorcerer had died and…memory returned and he remembered the roof caving in on him as he struggled to free Excalibur from the pocket dimension.  And then he’d blacked out.

He opened his eyes and he would have sworn, if he’d had the energy.  The roof had definitely caved in and he was trapped, barely able to move.  His armour had protected him from the worst of it, yet moving was a struggle.  He pulled himself forward, only to grunt in pain as the wreckage shifted and pressed down on his back, trapping him under the ruins.  Cursing, he fought to free even one hand, far too aware of mocking laughter echoing through his mind.  He’d been trained to recognise an outside intrusion into his mind back at the Garrison and he had no difficulty in recognising a mental broadcast, but it was astonishingly powerful.  The demon the Dark Sorcerers had been summoning had broken free.

The thought galvanised him and he struggled forward, making it nearly half a metre before the rubble shifted and trapped him again.  It felt as if an elephant was sitting on his back, pressing him down as firmly as a man might step on a crab, trapping it.  If there was anyone else in the wreckage, he couldn’t see them, let alone hear them.  The laughter drowned out anything as mundane as human voices.  He slowly became aware that the wreckage was moving, as if something impossibly huge was stamping the ground, high above him.  It didn’t take much imagination to realise that the demon had manifested as a giant, just as it had done once before.  The Dark Sorcerers had drawn inspiration from what had happened up north.

He swallowed a curse and reached for the talisman.  It fought him as if it were a thing alive, twisting and somehow defying his every attempt to touch it.  Slowly, he realised that the demon’s presence had distorted local reality to the point where the link to the pocket dimension had been twisted, yet he was aware of Excalibur’s energy reaching out to him.  Magic had never been his strong point, but he closed his eyes and reached out with his mind, feeling blue fire flickering around his hand.  He heard a roar of pure rage in the distance, audible even through the piles of rubble, and then Excalibur was in his hand.  The sword glowed with energy, so brightly that Robin had to look away, and then the world went white around him.  When it cleared, he was standing in front of the Houses of Parliament, staring up at the demon.

The sight should have shocked him senseless, just long enough to be lethal.  Instead, he felt the energy from the sword flowing into him, joining at a very primal level.  Even sex, with its sense of drawing closer and closer to Tiffany as he pressed into her, didn’t compete; they were one being!  The demon howled and lashed out with its claws, but Robin was already gone.  He leapt into the air and reached the roof of the House of Magus, before he leapt again, slashing out at the demon’s face.  It recoiled back and made to slap him away, as a man might slap at a particularly bothersome fly, but it was too late.  Robin landed casually and spun around the face the demon.  Its face contorted with an eerily inhuman rage and it blew a great cloud of fire at him.  Flames flashed through the surrounding buildings, sending them toppling down in sheets of fire, but Robin was unscathed.  If anything, Excalibur seemed to grow stronger from the flames.  

He ran forwards as the demon slammed a fist down beside him and slashed out at its wrists.  The demon howled in pain as Excalibur sliced into whatever it had that passed for flesh, but it didn’t seem to be weakened.  Brilliant red fire flared up around the cuts, the raw energy of Hell itself leaking into the air.  Robin felt the infernal magic twisting the air around him and knew that, whatever happened, Camelot would have to be abandoned.  The demon’s presence was blighting the land, its magic field causing unpredictable transformations in both humans and animals.  He saw a soldier warped beyond recognition in a split-second, but there was no time to go to him and help – and nothing he could have done in any case.  Excalibur kept him focused on the demon.  It was the only way to save something of the country, if not the world.

The demon advanced on him, massive feet shaking the ground with every step.  Robin held his ground as the demon advanced, right up until the moment it tried to stamp on him with staggering force.  He dodged at the last second, watching with sudden amusement as the demon’s foot crashed down into the underground cellars below one of the ducal mansions.  The scent of fine wines and expensive foodstuffs rose up for a long tantalising second, before the demon’s mere presence started to curdle the food, flames licking through the remains of the building.  Robin leapt and slashed out at the demon’s ankle, feeling Excalibur twisting its very nature to strike deep into the heart of the demon’s true body.  The demon staggered, howling in pain and rage; it leapt up, only to tumble backwards and come crashing down on another set of buildings.  Robin recoiled as more flames roared through the city, before Excalibur drove him forwards.  The demon was vulnerable now, as vulnerable as it would ever be.

Yellow eyes, glowing with sickly malice, met him as he ran towards the creature’s head.  Raw power, the kind of magic that even Dark Sorcerers could only dream of possessing, roared around him as the demon struggled to exert its will.  If he hadn’t been holding Excalibur, it would have killed him outright, or inflicted upon him a fate worse than death.  Even so, the magic tore at the surrounding buildings, warping them and transforming them into monsters that sought to block his path.  Flames flared up around the demon; Robin was sure that he could see faces in the flames, looking back at him in silent pleading.  The demon was old and powerful, older than mankind; how long had it been collecting souls?  What had it offered, Robin wondered, to tempt so many people into trading the one thing that inviolably belonged to them?

Excalibur flared with power as he leapt – not at the demon’s head, but at its heart.  Somehow – and Robin wasn’t quite sure how – he was able to see the demon’s true nature, the network of raw power that the demon had shaped into a form suitable for an incursion into the mortal realm.  It was far stronger than anything he’d seen constructed by mortal magicians, yet it had a weakness.  The demon could never be destroyed – after all, it was nothing apart from pure evil – but it could be banished back to Hell.  If one had the right weapon…

Desperately, Robin slashed down at the demon’s heart.  A part of his mind noted absently that the demon hadn’t bothered to manifest genitals – it was a sexless creature, when all was said and done – before Excalibur sliced into the demon’s chest.  It howled again, a wail that seemed to go on and on without an end, until suddenly it was gone.  The entire body snapped out of existence, leaving Robin tumbling to the ground.  Excalibur’s power vanished from the merge in the same instant; Robin caught hold of the scabbard desperately, drawing on its legendary power to heal himself as he struck the ground.  It shouldn’t have worked, but God smiled and he survived, barely.  There was a long second of pain and then he staggered to his feet, returning Excalibur to its scabbard. Perhaps it was his imagination, but the blade looked dimmer…

“My God,” he breathed.  The demon might be gone, but flames were still cascading through the city.  And there was no reason why the Dark Sorcerers couldn’t repeat the ritual.  Tiffany was somewhere nearby, but where?  “What do we do now?”

Chapter Forty-Four

“Impressive, would you not say?”

Maledict rubbed his hands together, indulging a kind of childish glee.  Duke Rufus Valditch seemed much less amused.  But then, the Duke’s opinions hardly mattered any longer.  Maledict didn’t need controlling spells to keep the Duke in line, not when exposure would utterly destroy him and his entire family.  The Duke had nowhere to go, so he collaborated with the Dark Sorcerers, no doubt telling himself that he was in control and he could end the alliance at any point.  Watching him crawl left Maledict filled with an eerie inhuman glee; this was true power.  The Duke, almost the physical representation of the social stratification that had left Maledict poor and friendless, was little more than his slave.

The massive pile of books lay open in front of them.  Maledict had jumped from book to book, skimming through them quickly to gain an idea of their contents.  Some had been mistakes, or copies of common books; others were so rare and old that they were written in languages that hadn’t been spoken on Earth for thousands of years.  The kidnapped and enslaved tutors were already working on translating some of them for the Dark Sorcerers, even though they were still trying to resist with everything they had.  It wouldn't be enough to help them escape from his control.

“Yes,” the Duke agreed, finally.  Maledict could tell that he was scared, even though he was trying hard to hide it.  But nothing could be hidden from a sorcerer with enough sensitivity to magic.  “What do you intend to do with it?”

Maledict smiled, darkly.  One of the books had told him that there was a way to restore and stabilize his body, the body that was being ravaged by dark magic.  His natural suspicion had been allayed by the realisation that the rite described by the books was banned, with very good reason.  Any loyalist sorcerer who risked using it would be hunted by Merlin and his lapdogs until he was brought down and destroyed.  Merlin had always forbidden human sacrifice, knowing how it could be used to bring both power and madness, and no one outside his inner circle had even known that the rite existed.  Until now, he told himself; power had always been his desire, yet with his body failing, he might not have long to live.  And he didn't want to spend the rest of eternity as a lich.

“I intend to use it to live,” he said, seriously.  He allowed his smile to grow wider.  If the Duke thought that he was crawling now, he could just wait until he heard what Maledict had in mind.  It would cost him far more than a few thousand smelly peasants.  “You will bring your daughter to my chambers.”

The Duke’s eyes went very wide and his entire body shook.  His daughter was still a child, without even the first flow of blood that would mark her transition to womanhood.  Maledict knew that Emma was still a girl, because the Duke would have married her off as soon as she entered the marriage circle – after all, a girl child might not be able to inherit the title, but she could gain the Duke greater influence, with the right choice of husband.  And now the Dark Sorcerers wanted her.  He could almost see the horrified thoughts running through the Duke’s mind, the terrifying possibilities...what would they want to do with her?  Duke Blackrock had had perverted desires, but the Dark Sorcerers might well be worse...

He wondered, absently, if the Duke would finally try to stand up to him.  It wouldn't have mattered – in the time they’d spent as his very unwelcome guests, he’d taken control of the castle’s staff and servants, even the girls who served the Duke as his pleasure slaves – but it might have been amusing.  The last set of reports from Camelot had also been amusing, yet Maledict hadn't been there to watch as the city was shattered by dark magic and a demon from the heart of the Darkness.  A single spell, powered by the vast reserve of power he’d been building up, could cut through the Duke’s defences and enslave him as surely as any of his servants.

“I will have her sent to you,” the Duke said, finally.  Maledict was almost disappointed, although he wasn’t surprised.  Aristocrats always put their own survival first, even at the cost of their friends and family.  “What do you intend to do with her?”

Maledict didn't answer immediately.  The rite called for a single death; the death of a virgin girl, pure and unsullied.  Few peasants were unsullied, but an aristocratic girl would have been carefully guarded by her family, if only to preserve her marriage potential.  He didn't intend to share that with the Duke.  If the man had any resistance left in him at all, he could cut his own daughter’s throat to spare her from a fate worse than mundane death.  The thought made him chuckle and the Duke shuddered, unable to disguise his revulsion.

“She will save my life,” he said, and explained.  The Duke’s face couldn't pale further, but his hands were shaking in fear.  Maledict considered taking control of him now, before deciding against it.  There was still amusement to be wrung from his suffering.  “Her life will be devoted to a higher cause.”

“Yes,” the Duke said, finally.

“Fetch her,” Maledict ordered.  “Now.”

***
High above them, Lucas recoiled in horror.  The network of secret passages that ran through the castle was a closely-guarded secret.  Only his father, himself and a handful of their most trusted guards knew about their existence, let alone the carefully-hidden ways in and out of the network and the cold iron used to mask their presence from magical senses.  He’d spent most of his time in the passageways, spying on the Dark Sorcerers and their slaves.  His father could have warned his allies, but he hadn't said a word to them about the passageways.  Lucas had chosen to regard that as a good thing, but now...

He was going to give them Emma!  Lucas’s youthful imagination could provide too many possibilities for what they intended to do to his sister as part of the rite, before sacrificing her to the Darkness.  He’d known that his father would have married them both off when a suitable match could be arranged – on one level, he accepted that as part of the price for being born into such wealth and power – yet Emma would have enjoyed some protection even when she moved out and joined her husband.  Few would have risked alienating the Duke by abusing his daughter – and Lucas, who doted on her, was the Heir.  And now...the Dark Sorcerers were going to take his sister and use her in their perverted rites.  Lucas couldn't protect her from that!

Without being truly aware of his actions, Lucas scrambled up the hidden shaft, climbing up towards his sister’s suite of rooms.  She’d stayed in them for the last few days, ever since the Dark Sorcerers had arrived; the only people who had seen her had been her personal maids, who’d fed her and cleaned her clothes.  Lucas cursed himself for not going to see her, even though it would have displeased his father.  What sort of brother was he when he couldn't even be bothered visiting his own sister?  The thought drove him onwards as he reached the exit and slipped out into a level passageway, illuminated by glowing elements in the walls.  He’d been told that the eerie light was undetectable, but no one had tested it against Dark Sorcerers.  Praying to a God he had never truly believed in, Lucas ran down the passageway and found the exit.  He peered through the knot in the wooden panelling and bit down on a curse.  His sister’s rooms were guarded by four of his father’s personal guards.

He walked quickly to the next exit and checked that the coast was clear, before stepping out into a room belonging to one of the chambermaids.  One of his father’s ancestors had used it for midnight sessions with his maids, before his wife had ordered him to abandon the other women and concentrate on her.  Lucas had enjoyed himself with his father’s female servants as well, but he’d never had to sneak around.  Why should he, when the lower class women should be grateful for his interest?  Now, too late, he had an idea of how they must have felt.

If the guards were curious about his appearance from the chambermaid’s room, they didn't show any sign of it on their faces.  Lucas studied them as he walked up to the door, concentrating on looking like the Heir to a Duchy.  His father had once told him that people wouldn't always question someone who acted like they had every right to be doing what they were doing, while they would be suspicious of anyone who looked as if they were sneaking around.  The guards were armed and armoured, carrying both rifles and swords.  Someone was taking no chances with security, or his sister’s safety.  A look into their eyes revealed that they were no longer loyal of their own free will.

They moved to block him as soon as he reached the door.  “None may pass,” the leader said.  Lucas knew him; they’d been close, or as close as Lucas had ever gotten to any of the hired help.  Hans had once been a master huntsman who had taught the young Lucas everything he knew about hunting.  Now his eyes were cold and dead, save only for the tiniest hint of suffering.  This was a man who was dead, yet still alive.

“Step aside,” Lucas ordered.  Before now, he would never have talked to Hans like that.  “I need to see my sister.”

“None may pass,” Hans said.  He placed his hand on his sword and his companions cocked their rifles.  “None may pass.”

Lucas studied them frantically.  He wanted to draw his own sword and fight, but even if he could beat Hans – who had trained him in swordplay – he couldn't hope to defeat all four of them.  If he pleaded...the controlling spells wouldn't let them show any pity, to Lucas or Emma herself.  His sister was a prisoner...how long would it be before the Dark Sorcerers came to take her for their own?  For a moment, he considered attacking the Dark Sorcerers themselves, but he knew it would be suicide.  They’d crush him like a bug and then sacrifice his sister anyway.  

“Keep her safe,” he ordered finally, and turned to go.  When he was around the corner, he broke into a run.  If he couldn't save his sister himself, he would need help – and only one person could help him now.  If she could help him...frantically, Lucas recalled everything that had passed between himself and the Lady Tiffany.  She had every reason to hate him for his arrogance and his belief that he had the right to anything and everything he wanted.  And now he’d grown up, too late.  What if she refused to help him?  There was no other choice.

He saw a pair of Dark Sorcerers ahead of him, mustering their slaves to carry books into the library.  Lucas was astonished to realise that he recognised two of the  slaves, both tutors from Beneficence College.  What had his father unleashed by allying with the Dark Sorcerers – and what could they do, armed with knowledge that Merlin had sealed away for hundreds of years?  The two slaves walked with the helpless droop of true despair.  Lucas’s heart went out to them, when it was far too late.  The best he could do was help himself.

The Dark Sorcerers never used the passageways the servants used, for whatever reason appealed to their twisted minds.  The young Lucas had explored them all, enjoying finding the quickest ways around the castle; later, he’d preyed on the serving girls when he finally realised that there was more to the difference between the sexes than funny anatomy.  Guilt gnawed at him as he slipped into the narrower passageways, praying that no one would block his pathway down to the stables.  If his father suspected what he had in mind, would he alert his new masters?  Would they even give him a choice?

And if the Dark Sorcerers reached out for him, Lucas knew better than to think that his skill with a sword would save him from a fate worse than death.

He wrinkled his nose as he finally reached the passageway that led down to the stables.  His father had only taught him responsibility in one area, looking after his horses.  Lucas had had to hire stable boys to take care of his horses, but he made certain to tend to each horse personally at least once a week.  Mucking out the stables was disgusting work, yet he had seen it as part of his responsibilities.  The stable boys had helped, of course.  There were limits.  

“Here boy,” he whispered.  The magnificent black horse at the other end of the stable fixed him with an icy gaze.  Lucas’s father had bought Bloody Thunder from a horse trader, believing that the horse was too dangerous to ride, but capable of impregnating many mares.  Lucas himself had risked riding Thunder and had achieved a rapport, of sorts, with the creature.  As long as he stayed in firm control, he was perfectly fine.  The second he showed the horse any kind of weakness would encourage it to try to unseat him and run off into the forests surrounding the castle.  “Come here.”

Bloody Thunder reluctantly complied.  He wasn't allowed out of the stables normally, if only because he’d kicked a young boy’s head in a few months ago.  Lucas swiftly saddled the horse, swung himself up into the saddle and opened the gate.  Bloody Thunder grunted and surged forward in a flickering motion that had Lucas hanging on for dear life.  Outside, stable boys and guardsmen scattered.  They all knew the horse’s reputation.  

Lucas dug in his spurs and sent the horse careering towards the gate.  Thankfully, his father’s masters hadn’t ordered the gates closed, knowing that it would alert any agents of the Tribunal who happened to be sniffing around.  They had put up a barricade, but Bloody Thunder soared into the air and jumped clean over the pile of barrels that would have deterred a lesser horse – and rider.  Lucas gave the horse its head as they raced down the road, dust rising up behind them; if they were lucky, his father would assume that he was going to be gone for the rest of the day.  Riding Bloody Thunder always took a day, if only so he could exhaust the horse before returning to the castle.  The beast never got enough exercise, apart from riding the mares.

The wind slapped against his face as the horse ran faster, galloping down the main road towards – eventually - Camelot.  Lucas saw peasant hovels flashing by, ignored by the horse; he hoped, prayed, that no one would be in their path.  The sound of hooves slamming against the ground grew louder as the horse, impossibly, galloped faster.  Bloody Thunder seemed to have sensed the urgency of his mission, or perhaps the horse was simply trying to outrun its rider.  Some horses were smart; Bloody Thunder was just dangerous as hell.  A moment of weakness, at this speed, could mean the end of him.

He could see the smoke rising from Camelot a long time before he saw the city.  Judging from what he’d overhead, the city had been badly damaged, although it shouldn't have been wreaked.  Or perhaps it had; the Dark Sorcerers had unleashed a full-blooded demon.  For the first time, he began to see refugees making their way down the road, looking for a safety that would prove elusive.  He wanted to warn them that they were heading right towards the Dark Sorcerers, but he didn't dare.  His mission was too important to risk.  A handful of soldiers, wounded, tired and as helpless as the rest, raised their weapons in salute as he passed.  They’d taken him for a Knight of the Round Table...

Bloody Thunder crested the hill and he found himself staring down towards Camelot.  Fires were burning everywhere and the air stank of death and dark magic, despite frantic attempts to call down wind and heavy rainstorms.  As he grew closer, he saw wizards working desperately to funnel water from the river that flowed past Camelot, the same river that Tiffany’s very distant ancestor had floated down to meet her doom.  The old legends seemed so close now that Merlin was gone and humanity was once again at the mercy of higher powers.  Lucas barely noticed when Bloody Thunder finally entered the city, neighing his defiance to the pools of dark magic infesting the ruined buildings.  A lesser horse would probably have turned to flee, throwing its rider off its back in a desperate attempt to run.

Lucas pulled on the reins and finally managed to slow the horse as they cantered through crowded streets, up towards the Iron Triangle.  The mansion his father had built was a ruin, he noted absently; almost all of the aristocratic mansions had been smashed with careless abandon.  Bodies lay everywhere, pulled out of the ruins and preserved under spells that would prevent decay, at least until they could be buried properly.  Bloody Thunder neighed again and slowly drifted to a halt.  A small cluster of men and women were waiting for him, led – he realised suddenly – by Tiffany herself.

For a moment, Lucas hesitated.  She had no reason to love him, let alone to help...and part of him just wanted to flee.  But his sister’s life was in terrible danger and he would do anything, even beg her husband for help, if it would save Emma’s life.  He slipped off the horse and went to one knee in front of Tiffany.  If nothing else, the gesture should convince her that he was deadly serious.

“I need your help,” he said, desperately.  His entire body hurt; the ride had finally caught up with him.  “I know where the Dark Sorcerers are – and they have my sister!”

Chapter Forty-Five

Tiffany listened in numb disbelief as Lucas blurted out his story.  She would never have expected the stuck-up youth Lucas had been to risk his precious life for anyone, even his charming sister.  Not that she had any doubts that his father would quite happily bargain with the Dark Sorcerers in his quest for power.  The Duke was capable of bargaining with the Devil Himself, let alone any merely human power.  And if Lucas had grown up enough to risk his life in a desperate search for help, the situation had to be serious...

“They won’t kill her at once,” Sorcerer Black said, when Lucas had finally finished.  There would be plenty of details locked away in his pretty head, but they’d have to dig those out carefully, perhaps with a trained interrogation team.  “I know the ritual you describe; it has to be performed at midnight, in the open air.”

Lucas looked up at him, desperately.  Tiffany saw a terrible suspicion flourishing in his mind, a fear that all sorcerers were somehow alike.  “How do you know that?”  He demanded.  “I thought that the ritual was lost...”

“Merlin insisted that some of the Tribunal know to recognise the signs,” Sorcerer Black admitted.  He sounded uncomfortable; even knowing about the ritual was risking execution, if anyone ever found out.  There was a kind of mindset that collected forbidden knowledge without ever daring to use it – and many sorcerers shared the attitude that knowledge alone was hardly dangerous.  “If they intend to use it as soon as possible, they will perform the ritual at midnight tonight.”

He closed his eyes in silent contemplation.  “They also need a Place of Power,” he added, after a moment.  “I think they’ll go to the Watchtower.”

Lucas frowned; Tiffany was equally surprised.  The Watchtower was older than Camelot, dating back to the days before Merlin.  No one knew who had raised it, or why; it had been a ruin for longer than even Merlin had been alive.  Like so many parts of the world that had been touched by wild magic, smart folk stayed well away from it.  Merlin had never mentioned the Watchtower to her...and Tiffany couldn’t imagine why it had even been constructed.  There was no border there, no reason to station guards...it wasn't even on the coast.  It was situated near the edge of Effrul, on the other side of the Duchy to Camelot.

Robin had his own thought.  “The Watchtower isn't particularly well suited for a covert ritual,” he pointed out.  “Why wouldn't they perform it somewhere well away from Effrul?”

“They could,” Sorcerer Black admitted.  “But if they’re in firm control of Effrul – and young Lucas tells us that they are – they won’t feel like risking an encounter with forces not under their control.  Why should they risk exposure when they don’t have to risk anything?  Once they perform the ritual – if it succeeds – they won’t even have to worry about dark sorcery ripping their bodies apart.  They’d have all the time in the world to complete our destruction.”

Tiffany rubbed her chin, thinking hard.  If nothing else, the demon that had almost torn apart Camelot had had the effect of focusing a few minds.  The power struggles in the Houses of Parliament had almost come to a halt, probably because the Duke of Effrul was occupied with the Dark Sorcerers.  There was even a new feeling that cooperation, rather than conflict, was the way forward.  Tiffany doubted that it would last past the next political crisis, but for the moment it gave her hope.  Who knew – maybe the horse would learn to sing.  With magic in the world, it was far from impossible.  

“We can't attack Effrul,” Major General Valiant admitted.  “The Garrison is scattered; we have maniples in Tara, occupying the Duchy, and the remainder of our force is here.  We just don’t have the manpower to take over the Duchy...”

“And they have the power to defeat the Garrison,” Sorcerer Black added.  “Their position is effectively impregnable.”

Tiffany rounded on him.  “Are you telling me that we’ve lost?”

“I am telling you that we cannot defeat them, not yet,” Sorcerer Black said.  His voice tightened; no matter how one looked at it, for the Duke of Effrul to have made an alliance with the Dark Sorcerers represented the ultimate failure of the Tribunal.  They had failed to stamp out dark sorcery and those who would use it for their own ends.  “Their position is strong...”

“No it isn't,” Robin said.  Tiffany had to smile at the hope in his voice.  “They have to go to the Watchtower, right?  And we can be there to meet them, tonight.”

“The area is infested with wild magic,” Sorcerer Black said, sharply.  “Going there could prove lethal...”

Robin touched the sword at his belt.  “We will have protection,” he assured him.  “We go there and hit them before they can begin the ritual.  You and your men set up wards, trapping them there; we can kill them all before their power overcomes us.  We can beat them!”

“It’s a mad plan,” Major General Valliant said.  The old soldier looked tired and broken.  When the time had come for the Garrison to be a proper army, it had failed – badly.  They had had no experience in practical war since the Serpent Wars, three hundred years ago, yet that was no excuse.  They’d failed and thousands of people had died because of their failure.  “You’d be risking everything on one shot...”

“Even if it fails, it would put them off balance,” Robin countered.  He looked up at Sorcerer Black.  “Can’t we make it work?”

“Maybe,” Sorcerer Black admitted.  “It would be chancy, but...”

He nodded, thoughtfully.  “We can make it work,” he said, firmly.  “I suggest that we start making preparations now.  If they truly intend to use the Watchtower, they will have their own people watching it soon enough.”

***
Robin looked sideways at Lucas without moving his head as the aristocratic youth followed him into the Garrison.  Tiffany was right; the young pompous brat he recalled from the deserted village, back before Merlin had departed, was gone.  In his place...there was a frightened young man, determined to do the best he could.  It was sobering to reflect that someone like the young Lord Lucas had had a decent person hiding behind his pale face and long blonde hair, but it proved that the central creed of the Knights of the Round Table was true.  Nobility – true nobility – only came into its own when a person was tested right to the limits of their abilities.

He watched as Lucas stared around him.  The Garrison had served as the home of the Knights of the Round Table for centuries; history was never too far away, not with the handful of Knights who survived their long careers bringing it to life for their successors.  The hallways were decorated with ancient weapons, each one bonded to a Knight who had died centuries ago, and covered with paintings of famous victories.  Robin saw Lucas’s eyes grow wider and wider as he took in the scene, a wistfulness entering his face that made him seem years younger.  Who knew what Lucas would have become if he’d been allowed to train as a Knight?

The Master of the Keep was standing in front of the doors that blocked the way to the armoury.  It wasn't the Armoury – that was lost, and likely to remain lost unless they located some clue as to where Merlin had hidden it – but in its own way, it was just as much part of the mythology surrounding Merlin and his Empire.  The doors, made from solid slabs of cold iron, opened as they approached, once the Master had given his blessing.  Robin recalled rumours that the Master had telepathic powers that allowed him to judge the soul of each potential Knight.  As always, the rumours seemed to be barely touching the truth.  The Master’s hawk-like eyes had passed over Lucas, and blessed him.

Robin braced himself as they stepped into the antechamber and the doors slid closed behind them.  A presence awoke on the air, a strange sensation that began as a gust of cold air and rapidly became a pair of invisible eyes staring right into their souls.  No one knew who the ghost had been, before Merlin had bound it to his service, but no one questioned its devotion to the Knights – and their cause.  If it had seen fit to reject them, they would have been rapidly ejected from the chamber and dumped into the building’s septic tank.  Instead, the second set of doors opened, allowing them entry.  Robin permitted himself a smile as Lucas stopped dead, struck by the sheer number of weapons within the chamber.

He led the way inside and smiled, taking in the swords, spears and axes that had been carefully crafted for the Knights of the Round Table.  They were all mundane weapons, yet they had all been produced individually, infusing them with a character denied to weapons that had been mass-produced in the free cities.  Enchanters and priests had worked on them, the former carving runes into the metal that would give them some supernatural aspects; the latter granting them their holy blessing.  He felt a shiver from his sword as he saw a single stone, standing in the heart of the chamber.  It’s physical form, he’d been told, depended on who was looking, for it was something other than what little his mortal mind could comprehend.  And once, King Arthur had pulled Excalibur out of the stone and proved his worthiness to be King of England.

Robin allowed Lucas a long moment to take in the sight and then gently guided him towards one of the stone tables.  A single blade, as black as the night, lay on the stone, its mere presence seeming to absorb all the light around it.  Robin felt Excalibur’s odd amusement as he studied the Bloodstained Blade.  Where Excalibur was regarded as a weapon of Light and Hope, the Bloodstained Blade had a far darker history.  And its wielder, who had taken it into battle against the demon, had been crushed under the demon’s foot.  Unsurprisingly, the Bloodstained Blade had been completely unharmed.

“There are stories about this blade,” Robin said.  He’d brought Lucas here on a hunch, one he suspected had come from Excalibur.  And yet, now he was with Lucas in the Armoury, he had his doubts about the wisdom of allowing him to pick up the blade.  “They say that it was once a great blade like Excalibur” – there was a definite sense of mocking amusement from Excalibur at that comment – “until Sir Lancelot of the Lake tried to use it to take his own life.  The sword purifies those with tainted souls who have not yet fallen to evil, but it comes with its own price.  Sir Worchester sinned and fell from the path; Merlin gave him the sword and told him to redeem himself.”

He’d expected Lucas to object to being called a tainted soul, but the young man said nothing.  Perhaps he had truly learned wisdom, after all.  Or perhaps he wasn't listening.  The Bloodstained Blade seemed to draw the mind towards it, even though it didn't seem to be entirely there.  But then, just like Excalibur, the form it took was a reflection of the limitations of the mortal mind.  It was far more than just a sword.  And no one knew where it kept its brain...

Robin hesitated, before feeling the nudging from Excalibur.  “Take it,” he said.  “If the blade accepts you, you will be able to pick it up.”

***
Lucas couldn't take his eyes off the Bloodstained Blade.  It drew his attention towards it, its sheer...presence imprinting itself upon the mortal world.  Somehow, despite all his childhood dreams of one day proving himself worthy of bearing a legendary blade, it was hard to reach out towards the sword.  The stories of what happened to an unworthy person who touched a legendary blade suddenly seemed very real.  Slowly, his hand moved towards the hilt...

The sword’s appearance seemed to change, flickering from image to image.  It was a curved blade from the Fertile Crescent...and then a long broadsword from nearer home...and then a pleasant blade, one of the few they were allowed to possess.  His hand touched the blade and it instantly stabilised into a short, but very firm sword.  Lucas realised with a sudden flicker of surprise that it was a copy of his very first sword, the one his father had placed into his hands when he had started training with Hans and the swordmasters.  He closed his hand around the blade and blinked in surprise.  At some level, he and the sword were very well matched.  It felt good for him, right in his hand.

He lifted it from the stone table and moved it through the air, astonished at how light it was.  Swords were heavy; they took years to learn how to use properly, unlike guns.  It was why the aristocrats had done everything they could to keep guns restricted, knowing that they could be used to alter the balance of power between the nobles and those they ruled.  And yet, the Bloodstained Blade seemed to move of its own accord.  He had the weird feeling that the blade would guide itself to its target, moving with icy precision that owed nothing to him.

“It seems to like me,” he said.  Robin snorted in amusement.  “What do I do to keep it?”

Robin considered for a long moment.  “Prove yourself worthy of it,” he said, finally.  “Do you feel a connection to the blade?”

Lucas considered.  He could feel...something, but what?  It was below the level of his awareness, a sense that he and the sword were linked on some level.  The legends said that the great blades could commune with their masters, yet he could feel no communication, only a chilling regard and awareness that was utterly inhuman.  Part of him wanted to put the blade down and run for his life, but the rest of him knew that that was impossible.  The Bloodstained Blade and he were linked now, forever...until death did them part.

“I think so,” he said, finally.  He struggled for words to describe it, and then gave up.  He assumed that Robin would have similar problems describing his link with Excalibur.  Emma’s face intruded into his thoughts and he pushed the Bloodstained Blade into his empty scabbard, unsurprised to discover that it fitted perfectly.  “When do we leave for the Watchtower?”

“Soon,” Robin said, vaguely.  

Lucas paced impatiently as Robin hunted for a handful of other items from the Armoury.  The thought of what might be happening to his sister – or even his father – kept him from settling down, despite Sorcerer Black’s reassurances that she would come to no harm.  Somehow, he wasn't convinced that the Dark Sorcerers had enough self-restraint to keep themselves from harming her, even if it was in their own best interests.  And then there were the servants – the cooks, the maids, the cleaners... – all of whom were at the mercy of the Dark Sorcerers.  Tiny fragments of guilt in his heart grew claws and started to slash away at his mind; he’d been their superior, yet he had treated them badly – and now he had abandoned them.  The chambermaid who had taken his virginity, the cook who’d been driven to distraction by his increasingly complex and expensive requests, the gardener he’d ordered whipped for stealing an apple...what kind of monster had he been?

The Bloodstained Blade’s hilt felt warm in his hand.  Slowly, Lucas realised what was happening to him.  The sword was holding up a mirror, one unblemished by his aristocratic snobbery and his firm conviction that he was superior to those of less fortunate birth...and showing him just how small he truly had become.  He tried to let go of the hilt, only to discover that it was impossible.  He’d learned his lesson...

For an instant, there was a moment of perfect communication.  And tell me, the sword seemed to say, what makes you think that there’s only one lesson to learn?

***
Outside the Garrison, Sorcerer Black had assembled a mixed team of combat magicians and Knights of the Round Table.  Robin reviewed them, wishing that he had a larger force yet knowing that a greater number risked exposure before it was time to spring the trap.  Fifty men, of whom only thirty possessed significant magical powers.  And Excalibur.  And the Bloodstained Blade...he’d tried questioning Lucas on just how many Dark Sorcerers there were, but Lucas had been unsure.  He’d only seen four together at most, yet Robin was sure that there were far more.  There was no way to know until the battle began.

“You saw what happened to Camelot,” he said.  Many others who should have been included in the force had died fighting the demon, or crushed by the Dark Sorcerers.  “We have one chance to destroy those responsible for the destruction of our city.  We know where they are going and we will be there before them, lying in wait.  And then we will destroy them.”

He sucked in a breath.  He’d never been very good at pre-battle speeches.  “If we win this battle, we will have won time for the Empire to learn to survive without Merlin,” he added.  “If we lose, we will not live to see dark sorcery consuming all that Merlin built, all that we are sworn to uphold.  The lives of everyone in the entire empire are at stake; our friends and families, our husbands and wives.  We must not lose.  We will not lose!”

Tiffany would have said it better, he was sure.  But then...soldiers and combat magicians wouldn't be impressed by pretty speeches.

“Grab your weapons,” he ordered.  They’d travel back on the railway, and then cross-country to the Watchtower.  “Let’s go.”

Chapter Forty-Six

Night was falling as Maledict led the Dark Sorcerers towards the Watchtower.  The moon was already rising in the air, moonlight blurring eerily with the wild magic flickering around the ruined building.  The Greenwood glowed with uncontrolled and uncontrollable magic, yet it gave the Watchtower a respectful distance, as if it was unwilling to challenge its presence.  Maledict peered at the building through his Sight, trying to make sense of the streams of magic floating around the ruined tower...it was as if the building wasn't completely within the mortal world, as if part of it was elsewhere.  In Avalon...or were there other realms that touched upon the mortal world?

He put the thought aside for later contemplation and looked at Emma.  The young girl was as beautiful as her brother was handsome, with long blonde hair and a perfect heart-shaped face.  A few more years and she would have been breaking hearts all over the Empire, but for now she was innocent, poised on the very edge of womanhood.  He looked down at his hands and winced as he saw blue flames consuming his flesh.  Dark sorcery’s price was catching up with him rapidly, as if it knew that he was on the verge of banishing it forever.

They’d dressed Emma in a dress made of the purest silk, shimmering white even in the near-darkness.  Her hair had been allowed to fall down around her shoulders, rather than copying the childish fashions that dominated the Court at Camelot.  There were many rites listed in the forbidden books that dated back to the Serpent Empire, noting that the magician-priests had had thousands of volunteers for the sacrificial tables.  The sacrifices had been treated like kings, with the best of food, drink and female company until the time had come for them to march out and be sacrificed to the gods.  If they’d walked out without resistance, without force or compulsion, the magician-priests could drain more power from their deaths.  He would enact such rites and rituals once he ruled the world, he promised himself.  The thought of such power was almost intoxicating...and, combined with the other secrets from the forbidden tomes, he would be able to prevent it from overwhelming him.

The Watchtower rose up in front of him and he paused, using his Sight to sweep the building for unexpected problems.  It was hard to perceive anything within the area – the interplay of wild magic flickering in and out of existence almost blinded him – but he was fairly sure that they were alone.  Smart folk would give the Watchtower and the Greenwood a wide berth, even if they were blind to the possible reasons behind its existence.  If it was watching for something, or someone...why?  And who had built it in the first place, if it predated Merlin?

Maledict chuckled and some of the Dark Sorcerers turned to look at him.  Whoever had threatened the land in the years before Merlin, they would be no match for Maledict and the power he had built up within his wards.  Once he had performed the ritual, he could garner power as he pleased, rising to match Merlin and take control of the world.  It was his; his to play with as he pleased – no one, even Merlin himself, would be able to take it from him.  Everyone living would become his plaything...he chuckled again and stepped into the Watchtower’s ruined hall.  Once, it had been an assembly room for soldiers; now, it was almost deserted.  Ghosts flickered in the shadows, watching him mournfully as his people filed into the room.  He ignored them.  Ghosts could do little other than scaring people and Maledict had seen far more terrifying things on his long climb towards dark sorcery.

In the centre of the chamber, there was a single stone table.  A beam of moonlight shone down near the table, crawling slowly towards it as the moon rose in the sky.  By Maledict’s calculations, the moonbeam would be right on the table at midnight, suggesting that this was far from the first time the Watchtower had been used for sacrifice.  Merlin had learned from the druids, he recalled suddenly, and the druids had been fond of sacrificing their enemies to the Old Gods.  Perhaps they’d built the Watchtower and abandoned it when King Arthur united the country and inaugurated the first Golden Age.

The ghosts grew brighter as two of his followers marched Emma up to the table.  There had been no need to enslave her or drug her – and either might have invalidated the sacrifice.  Instead, they’d settled for chaining her legs together, making it impossible for her to run.  At his instructions, none of the Dark Sorcerers had harmed her in any way, even the ones who shared Duke Blackrock’s vile perversions rather than the lust for power that defined the Dark Sorcerers.  He saw one of the ghosts, a man wearing a suit of armour that had gone out of style centuries ago, shaking his head in dismay.  Maledict ignored his presence as Emma was placed on the altar.  The girl seemed to have slipped into shock; she certainly offered no resistance as she was tied down, her dress pulled up to reveal a bare chest.  One of Maledict’s followers knelt at his feet and opened the box he carried, revealing a single stone knife, covered in runes.  It had taken most of the afternoon to create the knife, in accordance with the instructions for the ritual; if they hadn't had the enslaved tutors, it would have been impossible.  Their sole enchanter had been killed by Sir Robin.

Maledict settled back to wait as the moonbeam crept towards the table.  Soon, he told himself; soon...

***
Robin had endured an uncomfortable afternoon once they’d reached the Watchtower.  There was less cover than he had expected, forcing him to disperse most of his forces into the Greenwood, where they might be attacked by creatures of wild magic.  Robin himself, Sorcerer Black and Lucas had waited inside the Watchtower itself, hidden within the shadows.  It was a hell of a gamble, but with so much wild magic around they would be hidden from anything apart from a physical search.  And Dark Sorcerers often neglected the physical through their focus on the magical.

Night had fallen by the time the Dark Sorcerers arrived.  Two of them had generated light gloves to illuminate their path, allowing Robin to count them as they arrived.  There were twenty-five Dark Sorcerers, each one wearing the dark robes that marked a sorcerer and hid their faces from casual view.  Lucas had wanted to charge out at once as soon as he saw his sister, but Robin had put a restraining hand on his arm.  They had to trap the Dark Sorcerers within the Watchtower or they would just teleport out and escape – and their next hiding place would be impossible to find.  What he hadn't told Lucas – and had no intention of mentioning to him – was that if the Dark Sorcerers began the ritual, the only way of halting it would be killing the sacrifice.  Ideally, they should strike before the ritual had begun.

Sorcerer Black had – privately – disagreed.  Once the ritual had begun, the Dark Sorcerers would want to complete it and it might force them to decide to remain at the Watchtower and fight, rather than flee.  Robin had shaken his head at the though.  Lady Emma was an innocent and, as such, she was the type of person the Knights of the Round Table existed to defend.  Saving her, if possible, had to be a priority.  Killing her to stop the ritual came a very distant second.  Besides, terminating the ritual while it was uncompleted might well be very dangerous.

The moon kept rising in the sky as the Dark Sorcerers made their preparations.  Robin felt a cold shimmer of anger as they poured blood out across the chamber floor, blood they would have taken from innocent men, women and children whose only crime had been to remain loyal to their Duke.  Blood served as a channel for some of the darker forms of magic; naturally, the Dark Sorcerer hadn't risked using his own blood.  Robin wasn’t particularly surprised.  The ancient laws of magic would ensure that any consequences rebounded on the unwilling donors, rather than the Dark Sorcerer who had unleashed the madness.  Magic’s laws were strange, but they could not be gainsaid.  There was always a price for power.

Sorcerer Black nudged him, holding up a communications crystal.  Robin took it and communed with the combat magicians outside the Watchtower, hidden within the Greenwood.  Mental communication was impossible so close to the Dark Sorcerers – they’d detect it and realise that they were being watched – but using an enchanted crystal rendered the communication undetectable.  The combat magicians were stealthily coming out of concealment and preparing to erect wards that would keep the Dark Magicians trapped within the Watchtower, unable to teleport away.  Robin’s lips twitched.  The Knights of the Round Table had shared stories about Knights who’d done things like climbing into a bear’s cage and wrestling it into submission, but most such stories ended with the Knights being badly mauled.  Trapping the Dark Sorcerers would be about as safe as sneaking up behind a tiger and pulling its tail...

Lucas twitched beside him as he caught sight of his sister, clearly on the verge of running forward and trying to save her.  The young girl was definitely dazed, unsure of where she was or of what was happening to her.  Robin silently thanked God for small mercies, even though it wouldn't invalidate the sacrifice.  Her soul would be in a better place, whatever happened to her physical body.  They wouldn't be able to make her despair and call on Satan, rather than placing her faith in God...

There was no sign of her father, Robin noted, absently.  Perhaps the Dark Sorcerers had finally grown tired of their game and killed him, or enchanted him into becoming their slave.  It seemed odd that they would throw away such an asset – the wards around the House of Lords would have sounded the alert if he’d entered while under outside control – but after they’d unleashed a demon on Camelot, they might well feel that they no longer needed the Duke.  Robin suspected that they would need him, if direct conquest and rule was their aim, yet perhaps they weren't interested in ruling the world.  They might just want to have fun, with no one able to stop them...

He looked up at the moonbeam’s steady advance and prayed for the combat magicians to finish their work quickly, before time ran out.  Robin didn’t want to kill the girl, even to prevent a greater catastrophe.  She was an innocent...even the thought that Tiffany would understand if there was no other choice failed to reassure him.  He didn't want to die with such a stain upon his soul...and so close to the Dark Sorcerers, death was always a possibility.  The few who’d met Death and walked away alive had said that she looked like a very young girl...nothing like the hooded skeleton that was depicted in legend.  Merlin had long banished the endless personifications of universal concepts from the mortal world, but with his departure perhaps they would return.  At least they weren't as dark and malevolent as the Faerie.

A ghost shimmered into existence in front of him, eyeing him sadly.  Robin refused to show any fright, or even alarm; the ghost was no real threat to him.  There were some ghosts that could be very dangerous – he recalled the ghost of one house that had waged a supernatural war on his descendents, who hadn't appreciated the collection of artworks and knickknacks he’d built up over the years – but this one was just a memory, a legacy of a long-forgotten war.  He’d seen paintings of men wearing similar armour, Romans from Rome who had come to Britannia only to find themselves waging war against the druids and the wild magic that had shimmered on the air.  They’d never even come close to gaining control over the northern reaches of the country.  The ghost eyed him sadly and shook its head.  Its translucent form faded and was gone.

Robin touched his sword’s hilt as the Dark Sorcerers broke into a chant, and then into a dance.  Suddenly, as if they were no longer in control of themselves, they were dancing, their feet stamping the ground in obedience to an inaudible tune.  They whirled around and around in circles, not unlike the whirling dervishes from the Fertile Crescent, their voices blurring into one note.  Their leader, standing next to the table, was unmoved.  Robin frowned in puzzlement, trying to understand.  They didn't seem to be performing a magical rite...

Understanding clicked.  The Dark Sorcerers had never posed a major threat before for two reasons, one of which had been Merlin’s presence on Earth.  The other...dark sorcery took a terrible price from the bodies of those who risked using it for power, shortening their lifespans even if they didn't wind up being hunted down and destroyed by the Tribunal, or Merlin himself.  It was reassuring to think that they would fade away even if Tiffany and the remains of Merlin’s Government failed to stop them, but Robin suspected that that wasn't about to happen.  The Dark Sorcerers were spreading the burden of the power, sharing it between themselves...and sparing themselves much of the ravages caused by touching dark sorcery.  He ground his teeth in anger; a magical breakthrough, perhaps the most significant breakthrough since the first Enchanters had figured out how to infuse magic into objects, and it had been made by a Dark Sorcerer.  They would continue to pose a threat until they were all wiped out...

The communications crystal glowed once in his hand, sending the thoughts of one of the combat magicians directly into his brain.  The wards were ready; they only required his command to bring them up into existence, trapping the Dark Sorcerers at the Watchtower.  Robin caught Lucas’s arm and held up three fingers, counting down the minutes.  Lucas had never been trained at any of the Knight Schools, let alone been Knighted by his Lord, but even he should know the basic hand signals.  He hoped...

He passed the crystal back to Sorcerer Black and took hold of Excalibur’s hilt.  The moment he drew it from the scabbard, they’d know he was here and try to run.  If they were very lucky, the confusion they’d feel when they discovered that they were trapped would last long enough for Robin to cut down the leader – clearly the most powerful – and prevent any of them from taking control.  Dark Sorcerers only recognised one thing as giving the right to rule: power.  And all of them would be scheming to boost their own power and overthrow their master.  In one sense, Robin thought, with a flicker of amusement, it was more honest than the political manipulations of Camelot.  But raw power alone didn't confer leadership abilities...

***
Patience was not something that came easily to Lucas.  Sure, he’d hunted – and that required a certain kind of patience – but he’d never had to wait for something as fundamentally important as rescuing his sister from a fate worse than death.  No one of his birth had had to wait for anything, ever; not female company, not power...not even a marriage, if they wanted to push for one.  

Emma’s haunting white dress looked like a mocking parody of a wedding dress.  Lucas knew very little about how symbolism affected magic, but the symbolism of innocence going to the slaughter wasn't lost on him.  The only thing holding him back from charging out, sword in hand, was the quiet pressure from Robin and the awareness of the Bloodstained Blade awaiting its moment.  It was very hard to understand what the sword was telling him – it seemed to communicate in concepts, rather than words – but it wanted to wait.  Wait until what, Lucas had tried to ask, but if there had been an answer it had been beyond his understanding.  The sword was keen to wait...

The dance was slowly coming to an end, he suspected.  He wasn't sure how he knew – and it might have been the sword’s influence – but the dancers were slowing down and raising their hands in eerie unison to clap.  Lucas had been to formal balls ever since he’d been presented at Camelot, yet none of the dances had ever had the same strange precision that the Dark Sorcerers had shown.  At some level, they were puppets, but puppets of what?  Their master, standing and watching with his face hidden behind the eerie darkness of his hood, or someone – something - far darker?  All the tales about the dark forces that had prowled through the dark of the night before Merlin had established the boundary lines suddenly seemed very believable.  

He shivered as he realised that the moonbeam had finally reached his sister’s bare chest.  The Dark Sorcerers master held up his blade as the dance came to an end, chanting words in a language long forgotten outside the old tomes.  Lucas grasped the Bloodstained Blade, but something prevented him from drawing it, no matter how hard he tugged.  Beside him, Robin was moving with uncanny stealth, one hand on his own sword hilt.  

The Dark Sorcerer’s chant finally came to an end.  Robin stood up, drawing Excalibur in one smooth motion.  The glowing blade drove the shadows away, illuminating their presence and sending the Dark Sorcerers into confusion.  Their master seemed torn between plunging the blade into Emma’s chest and turning to flee.

“Now,” Robin bellowed.  The Bloodstained Blade came free in Lucas’s hand, an eerie blade glowing with the colour of freshly-spilled blood.  He had a moment to see the Dark Sorcerers recoil from the sight, before the blade was suddenly dark, thirsting for blood.  It had an almost vampire-like desire to feed.  “For Camelot!”

And he charged. 

Chapter Forty-Seven

Maledict spun around in surprise.  The sheer presence of two powerful blades almost froze him into immobility.  Only luck – and a hefty burst of magic – sent him cart-wheeling away from the two oncoming Knights, each one wielding a blade that could cut through magical protections.  He landed on the far side of the chamber and spat out a curse that should have stopped them both in their tracks, only to see the curse harmlessly absorbed by the glowing sword.

Cursing, Maledict attempted to teleport out of the Watchtower, but the teleport spell refused to form properly.  An instant’s check revealed that someone had established light wards around the ruined building, hardly enough to stop someone running for their life, but enough to ensure that any teleporting sorcerer bent on escape scattered his molecules over the entire world.  He reached out, attempting to infuse the Watchtower with magic that would allow him to turn the building against his foes, but the Watchtower’s eerie nature resisted his magic.  They were trapped!

He reached down into the vast reserves of power he’d stockpiled over the past hours and started to spend it freely.  Some of his followers were warped and transfigured into monstrous forms, their human flesh running into sharp claws and savage teeth; others were directed to use their own magic to attack the glowing swords.  Flames burst up out of nowhere, flaring through the Watchtower, yet they refused to touch the two Knights.  A third person, hanging back in the shadows, calmly deflected a spell that should have blown him into a million pieces.

Maledict sent his awareness outside, only to realise that the trap was still being sprung.  There were combat magicians out there, combined with Knights of the Round Table.  They might have been individually weaker than his Dark Sorcerers, but they were working in unison and his followers would not – could not.  There was no escape, unless they won the fight – and somehow that seemed unlikely.  They couldn't even touch the two mythical blades.

He remembered all he’d learned from Faye and the abducted tutors and started to concentrate on more subtle forms of attack.  Green mist appeared out of nowhere and streamed towards its targets, the two armoured Knights.  Bright flashes of light struck the ground next to them, forcing them to duck and dodge as entire pieces of stonework were blasted free of the Watchtower.  An attempt to bring part of the ceiling down on their heads was deflected by the enemy sorcerer, who casually redirected Maledict’s stream of power and thrust it into the face of one of his most powerful followers.  There was no time to cancel the spell before it wiped the man from existence, leaving only a pair of smoking boots on the ground.

The lead Knight lunged at him, his face hidden under his helm, but his style oddly familiar.  Sir Robin, the man who had betrayed his lair’s location to the Tribunal; the man deemed worthy to bear the most powerful weapon in all of existence.  Maledict felt cold hated rising within his breast and he drew on his own magic carelessly, shaping a sword and armour out of raw magic.  The sword was animated by his own will, nothing more; it shattered as soon as it touched Excalibur.  He shaped a second spell and then a third, before he called on his magic to blow a gust of freezing wind right into the face of his foe.  The Knight staggered backwards and Maledict took the opportunity to put a great deal of distance between them.  If he could break the wards...

Faye could have channelled both sets of magic simultaneously, but Maledict had never had to learn.  His practice had been in a far less stressful situation – and most of his opponents could be dispatched by raw power alone.  Only the High Magus had come so close to defeating him, and he hadn't carried the most powerful weapon in the world.  He realised numbly that the second Knight had removed the girl from the table, ensuring that she could not be used as a sacrifice.  Besides, the moonbeam had already advanced into the Witching Hour.  The time was no longer right for the ritual.

With a howl of pure rage, he threw his magic at his foe and fought to escape.  He had to escape; without him, the cause of dark sorcery was lost...

***
Lucas would never know if his mad leap had been powered by his own determination to rescue his sister or if the Bloodstained Blade had helped, but it hardly mattered.  He landed on top of the table, his sword flaring out to decapitate a pair of Dark Sorcerers who had sought to attack him as soon as he jumped.  Raw magic fizzled around the blade, leaving his hair standing up on end, but somehow the blade absorbed the magic.  A third Dark Sorcerer, his body warped into a cross between a human and a werewolf, appeared out of nowhere, yet Lucas saw him and cut him down with a ruthlessness that surprised him.  The Bloodstained Blade’s bloodlust was growing stronger.

He heard a moan below him and looked down at Emma.  His sister’s eyes were pale, barely aware of her surroundings; she cringed back from Lucas as if she expected him to be another tormentor.  The sight left him tottering between despair and anger, but somehow he managed to slash down with the blade and cut through her ties, freeing her from the table.  A Dark Sorcerer lunged for her, knife in hand, and Lucas threw himself at the mad magician.  There was no thought to the motion; nothing, but pure rage and determination.  The Dark Sorcerer’s eyes widened as he saw the black blade, before Lucas plunged it into his chest.  He let out an ear-splitting yell as he lost control of the power stored within him and his body exploded in malevolent light.  Lucas shielded Emma as best as he could, praying that the Bloodstained Blade would shield them both.  Raw magic in its darkest form could be utterly lethal, leaving its victims quite beyond any hope of salvation.

“Get under the table,” he snapped to Emma.  She was in shock, but somehow she managed to obey – or they’d drugged her with something to make her compliant.  Lucas turned as she shielded herself, facing a group of five Dark Sorcerers who had warped themselves into monsters.  They came at him, all fangs and teeth and claws; Lucas braced himself and then lunged forward.  Deadly claws reached for him and he laughed...

The bloodlust rose up within him, pushing him forward.  He could hear the sword singing in his mind, pushing him to strike down his enemies with neither fear nor favour.  A Dark Sorcerer, now warped beyond the creatures within the Greenwood, was torn apart by a single blow, leaving blood and guts splashing down on the floor.  The old Lucas would have been horrified; even the new Lucas was concerned...but the bloodlust drowned everything out.  He heard a roaring in his ears as the second Dark Sorcerer was struck down, followed by the third.  A berserker rage seemed to have come over him, driving him to throw himself at the enemy without any regard for his personal safety.  At some level, he knew that he was being wounded, but it hardly seemed to matter.  All that mattered was satisfying the bloodlust.

Another Dark Sorcerer – he’d lost count – was trying to cast a spell, throwing an unearthly green flare of light towards Lucas before he could react.  The spell exploded on the Bloodstained Blade, somehow enhancing the rage he felt channelled through the sword.  Green light flared around the blade for a long moment, only to be spat out and harmlessly absorbed by the walls.  Lucas was suddenly aware of great and powerful magic flaring through the Watchtower as it became aware of the fighting within its environs, although he couldn't tell if it intended to lash out at the puny mortals infesting its core.

He roared in rage and threw himself at another sorcerer, and then another.  The bloodlust was overpowering, driving him onwards...until he heard a cry.  Emma was crying; whatever they’d done to her, be it shock or a drug or a spell, was wearing off.  Lucas hesitated, just long enough for one of the monsters to land a blow that should have decapitated him.  The bloodlust flared up again, but this time he understood.  There was no such thing as an easy redemption, not even for him.  Giving into the sword’s lust for blood would mean giving up his only chance at redemption – and perhaps Emma’s only chance for life.

Lucas stepped backwards, lowering the blade.  How many had died, slashed apart by the Bloodstained Blade?  The walls and ceiling were covered in blood...he tried to remember, only to discover that his memory had faded, tinged with berserker rage.  His armour was covered in blood, none of it his; his body was aching from the stress he'd put on it, or minor wounds that had healed almost instantly.  Apart from the Dark Sorcerer fighting Robin, there were no other enemy left within the chamber.  He looked up and saw Sorcerer Black shaking his head.  The Tribunal-trained sorcerer seemed oddly amused by his dilemma.

“Everything comes with a price,” Sorcerer Black said.  His voice was calm and gentle, yet Lucas could feel the sword’s cold rage at the thought of anyone taking advice from a sorcerer.  Or was that his own thoughts being reflected back to him?  Without Merlin, every sorcerer would be able to proceed down the path that led to dark sorcery, for no one would dare stand in their way.  “I’d advise you to be careful when you choose to draw that blade, young man.”

He didn't seem inclined to say anything else.  Lucas glared at him, but he refused to be cowed.  Was he thinking about dark sorcery...?  Lucas looked down at the blade and knew that he, at least, would stand between sorcerers and the moral corruption brought by dark sorcery.  And Robin and Tiffany and so many others would join him...putting the thought aside, he helped Emma out from under the stone table and pulled her to him, heedless of how the blood was staining her dress.  He'd have to take her out of the Watchtower, back to the Garrison – they’d look after her, he was sure – before heading back to his castle.  The Duke would have to be removed...

On one level, he was shocked at his own decisiveness.  When had he ever made a decision for himself?  His father had dominated him, indulging him and at the same time shaping him into his ideal heir.  And now...now he was his own man.  And children had responsibilities towards their parents.  The Privy Council might have their own ideas about what should happen to a Duke who partnered himself with dark sorcery, but Lucas was determined that he would get to his father first.  He would redeem himself by removing his father personally.

A roar split the chamber as the Dark Sorcerer fighting Robin realised what had happened.  He’d lost everything, Lucas realised...and no longer looked even remotely human.  Robin was fighting hard, but even Excalibur seemed daunted by the raw magic surrounding the sorcerer.  Slowly, Lucas reached for the Bloodstained Blade, wondering when he'd returned it to its scabbard.  If Robin couldn't beat the Dark Sorcerer...

***
Robin’s armour was already scorched and pitted as blast after blast of dark magic snapped against his skin.  Even Excalibur seemed to have reached its limits in coping with the Dark Sorcerer, who seemed to be transforming into something utterly inhuman.  Parts of his skin had completely burned away, to be replaced by dark energy and a power that somehow animated his skeleton.  His red eyes burned with an unholy glare, sending Robin staggering backwards...even with Excalibur in his hand.  The sword’s glow was dimming fast...had the demon somehow damaged the sword beyond repair?

The Dark Sorcerer’s form broke down into an eerie translucent mist.  Robin slashed out at it with his blade, but even his sword passed through it harmlessly.  The Dark Sorcerer formed a fist and slammed it into Robin’s helm, leaving him staggering from the sheer weight of the blow.  It would have smashed his skull without the protection of his armour...cursing, Robin stepped backwards, looking for a target.  But even Excalibur seemed daunted by the sorcerer’s rapid transformation.  He’d become a creature of pure dark magic.

Robin jumped backwards, silently noting that Lucas and Sorcerer Black were escorting Emma out of the chamber.  At least one innocent would survive...the rest of the Dark Sorcerers had either been killed by the forces waiting outside or had managed to escape into the Greenwood.  Brimming with magic as they were, they’d still present a danger – but if they managed to destroy their leader, it would take them some time to reassemble and start plotting again.  

Maledict roared with rage and came after Robin, forcing him to jump backwards as lightning flashed from his translucent hands, blasting through the air towards him.  The Dark Sorcerer seemed to have access to almost limitless power, yet Robin knew that that could not be the case.  If he could force the Dark Sorcerer to expend his power carelessly, surely he would eventually run out of power – and without power, the force holding his inhuman body together would collapse.  If...the Dark Sorcerer seemed to have realised that he was no longer bound by human limitations.  His form was losing its humanoid aspect, allowing him to appear as an eerie glowing mist, sparkling with power.  Robin had seen similar shapes in the Greenwood, yet he’d never connected them with the Dark Sorcerers.  There had been no reason to think that there might be a connection.

Lucas appeared suddenly behind the Dark Sorcerer and rammed the Bloodstained Blade through the mist.  It seemed to slip around the blade, as if it wasn't quite touching the sorcerer’s form.  Sorcerer Black stepped forward and wove a containment ward, only to stagger backwards as Maledict casually overpowered the ward and lashed out towards him.  The sheer force of the magic involved picked Sorcerer Black up and sent him slamming into the wall, crashing against the stone with a sickening crash.  Robin knew that sorcerers were tough, yet surely no one could have survived...it hardly mattered; the moment he took his attention away from the Dark Sorcerer, he would die.  His enemy was starting to form a humanoid face out of the mist, fixing him to the spot with an inhuman glare.  Excalibur seemed to almost wilt in his hand...the sword needed time to regenerate and if they failed to beat the Dark Sorcerer, there would be no time for it to regenerate.  It could die...

Sheer fury drove Robin forward, ramming right through the Dark Sorcerer.  There was a sudden sense of cold, as if he’d suddenly plunged into an icy cold bath, as if every molecule of his body had been exposed to the coldest sensation in the world.  Maledict howled at the intrusion and tried to expel Robin, but his magic seemed to refuse to turn on itself.  Robin brought his sword up and sliced into the translucent figure, praying that it would be enough...

***
Maledict could barely think any longer.  The sheer power in the two legendary swords was too much; every time they slashed through his new form, his thoughts shattered and had to reform slowly.  His power was being spent on maintaining himself and he knew he should try to return to humanity, yet the moment he restored himself he’d be killed.  Desperately, unsure of what he was doing, he drew on his magic one final time and resonated with the magic spilling through the Watchtower.  He heard something screaming in agony – and frustrated rage – and then he was suddenly aware of the wards breaking at his touch.  His mind right on the verge of total collapse, his power draining away, he shaped a thought in his mind...

And the world went away in a flash of green light.

***
Robin had barely a second’s warning from Excalibur, just enough to save him from being torn apart by the teleport spell.  The Dark Sorcerer – no longer human – was gone.  Lucas stumbled to his knees as the Bloodstained Blade relaxed its hold on him, his face twisted between bloodlust and revulsion.  Robin pulled himself back to his feet and swore aloud.  The wards they’d set up were gone, which meant that their target had escaped...try as he might, he couldn't convince himself that it was anything other than a very bad sign.

Slowly, as he leaned against one of the stone walls for support, he became aware of great power stirring within the Watchtower.  Images flickered in and out of existence around him, some from the far distant past and others from a future that might never come to pass.  He saw mighty sorcerers and druids, facing the Romans when they invaded the home of magic itself...and he saw Knights in armour, carrying weapons that seemed to be the far distant descendents of the firearms manufactured by the free cities.  Great power was pressing down all around him...and then a voice spoke directly into his head.

IS IT TIME?  The voice demanded.  HAVE THEY COME?

“No,” Robin said, finally.  His voice sounded small and weak compared to the terrible voice that was echoing through his mind.  Lucas, who’d clearly heard the same thing, gave him a shocked look.  Robin ignored him.  Whatever was waking up within the Watchtower was clearly ancient, with such great power that waking it up ahead of time might prove uniquely dangerous.  He had no idea what the Watchtower was watching for, but he had a suspicion that their arrival would have been obvious.  “They have not come.”

GO, the voice thundered.  They found themselves outside the Watchtower, surrounded by shocked combat magicians and Knights.  DO NOT RETURN.

Lucas looked a question at Robin, who shrugged.  “It’s time to put an end to this,” he said, firmly.  The mystery of the Watchtower could wait.  “Let’s go.”

Chapter Forty-Eight

The execution of Duke Rufus Valditch was carried out one week after the Battle of the Watchtower.

Lucas hadn’t been ordered to attend, but he’d forced himself to watch as his father’s head was neatly separated from his body by the executioner.  By then, death had probably been something of a relief; his father had been alternating helplessly between madness and lucid rationality, where he’d understood just how badly he’d failed.  Lucas hadn’t been confirmed as Duke in his place, but he no longer wanted the post.  The price was far too high.  Afterwards, he’d walked out into the gardens and found a place to sit, staring down at the Bloodstained Sword.  He could still feel its presence at the back of his mind, waiting.

He thought he understood, now that there was a moment of peace.  The sword lusted for blood and holding it – wielding it – gave vent to some of humanity’s most terrible impulses.  And yet, if he mastered the sword, he would master himself.  The bloodlust had to be quenched, along with the desire for power without responsibility.  A man wielding the sword could make himself a king, yet its power came with a price, the price of self-reflection.  Lucas had been a fool, in so many ways; the sword merely illuminated them for him and allowed his mind to do the rest.

Tiffany found him there, two hours after he’d settled down.

“I’m sorry about your father,” she said.  She sounded as if she meant it, even though she was now effectively the Regent for two Duchesses.  It would be years before either Lady Gwendolyn or Emma came of age, and by that time Tiffany would have used their votes and powers in the House of Lords to ensure that the new political settlement was solid.  Her method wasn't entirely legal, but no one would dare object.  Questioning her right to serve as Regent would bring hundreds of other matters into question.

“I’m not,” Lucas lied.  In truth, his feelings were conflicted.  His father had been a good father at one point, before his son had grown up into a vain young man.  Or was he just remembering the good and forgetting the bad, now that his father was gone.  Emma would mourn him openly, as was right and proper, yet Lucas could never bring himself to do that, not when his father had committed so many crimes.  He’d been astonished to discover how many half-sisters and brothers he had, sired by his father in the hopes of producing someone with formidable magical power.  “What do you want?”

Tiffany didn’t seem annoyed at his rudeness.  “Here,” she said.  She reached into the bag she carried and produced a single black shield.  Lucas took it in surprise.  It was utterly unmarked, yet the very lack of marking betrayed its wearer’s true nature.  He was a Knight without a master, without a lord; a Knight sworn to nothing, but his own conscience and God. “I want you to have this.”

Lucas stared down at the unmarked shield.  “Why?”

“You have to do something with your life,” Tiffany said.  Lucas raised a questioning eyebrow.  “You took – and hold – the Bloodstained Sword.  I think you have a right to wear the black armour, don’t you?  Besides, it will give you a chance to make up without having your father’s life and crimes rubbed in your face.”

She stood up, placing the rest of the bag at his feet.  “The armour isn’t passed from Knight to Knight,” she said.  “A Knight wears the black armour if he feels he should wear it…but then, you will know all this already.  The choice is yours.”

Lucas watched as she walked away, and then looked down at the armour.  The original Black Knight had been a mysterious righter of wrongs and servant of God, his true identity lost to the mists of time.  Even King Arthur hadn’t known, although that hadn’t stopped countless bards from speculating that the reason King Arthur and the Black Knight were never seen together was that they were one and the same.  Merlin…it was hard to tell what Merlin had known, or thought, but if he’d felt that the Black Knight was a menace he would have blown him out of existence with a snap of the fingers.  Later, after Merlin had established the Pendragon Empire, Black Knights had continued to appear, wear their armour and fight in a noble cause…and then vanish.  It had honestly never occurred to Lucas, who had grown up reading the tales of noble knights, that Merlin might have been choosing those who wore the black armour.

He thought he understood, at last.  The Black Knight was dependent upon his own wits and skill with a sword.  He couldn’t call upon a master’s protection, or whatever aristocratic rights his birth entitled him to claim.  His skill was all that would keep him alive…

…And if Lucas wore the armour, he would no longer be the son of a disgraced Duke.

Slowly, almost reverently, he began to don the armour.

***
Tiffany watched from a distance as Lucas started to dress himself, and then turned and walked away before he could see her standing there.  Meeting him had been a duty; unpleasant, but necessary.  She couldn’t risk allowing him to wander around on his own, not carrying a sword that killed its wielders as often as it saved their souls.  Lucas was the Heir to a Duchy, after all; there were too many other aristocrats who’d rally behind him if they believed he’d been sidelined deliberately.

Camelot had almost been abandoned, with much of the civil servants who kept the government running moving to the remains of Londinium.  The dark magic unleashed by the demon had contaminated the entire city, even through the sorcerers believed that it could eventually be cleansed and returned to normal.  Tiffany doubted that it was possible; Merlin, given all of his power and abilities, had never even tried to cleanse Kentigern.  The Houses of Parliament had accepted the move grudgingly, pointing out that Camelot had been the centre of the Empire for over a thousand years, but they’d never tried to block the move.  She suspected that prudence and common sense had been allowed to triumph over the bloody-minded determination to have their own way that normally affected anyone sitting in the Houses of Parliament.  After all, the magic contaminating the city was no respecter of noble personages.

She walked into the Keep and up through the handful of armed guards until she reached the War Room.  Most of the Garrison had already decamped to their new home, even though a token force would remain behind to guard the city’s vital buildings.  They’d just have to get used to living without Merlin’s infinite source of magic to power the devices they’d used to monitor the Empire.  These days, the enchanters and alchemists were barely keeping up with demand for newer devices that didn’t need Merlin to work properly.

Robin smiled at her as she joined him and peered down at the map.  They hadn’t found Maledict, the leader of the Dark Sorcerers.  Robin’s account had suggested that Maledict had been consumed by his own magic, but Tiffany’s intuition told her that the Dark Sorcerer was still alive, somewhere well away from civilisation.  The devices they could have used to track him down no longer functioned – and it was doubtful that they would have worked in any case.  Maledict had renamed himself when he became a Dark Sorcerer and killed anyone who might have been able to betray his real name.  Without that information, it was unlikely that any form of tracking magic could find him without a sample of his blood.  Anything else that might have belonged to him was useless.  He knew how to ward himself against such crude forms of detection.

“We got the report from Sir Lancaster,” Robin said, grimly.  Tiffany looked up at him, sharply.  “All of the boundary lines are gone.  There are no reports of contact with the supernatural creatures from the Greenwood, or Avalon, but it’s only a matter of time.”

Tiffany shivered.  She’d known that the lines were falling, yet she’d dared to hope that they would find a way to replace them before it was too late.  They hadn’t; the enchanters and alchemists, wizards and wardens, who’d worked on the remains of the boundary lines hadn’t been able to understand how Merlin had done what he’d done, let alone duplicate it.  Merlin had been so powerful that his every act was beyond their comprehension, his raw power allowing him to skip steps that wizards or even sorcerers would need to follow.  Robin was right.  It was only a matter of time before the supernatural creatures started returning to their old haunts, drifting out of Avalon and into the mortal world.  And then there would be war as society collapsed under their pressure.

“The villages nearest the Greenwood will be the first to fall,” Robin said.  His tone hadn’t changed.  “I think we need to begin evacuating them and moving the population to the free cities…”

“The Lords won’t agree,” Tiffany said.  She shook her head.  Putting together the political compromise that had allowed the Empire to survive had taken every last bit of her political capital – and only her regency for two immature Duchesses had allowed her to push it through, against opposition from both the Lords and the Commons.  Evacuating the villages nearest the Greenwood would outrage the Lords, who would believe that they were being stripped of their peasants in a move to weaken their standing.  And besides…without the farms, how would they feed the population?  Tiffany had already started planning to stockpile as much food as possible, but it wouldn't be enough.

“They don’t have a choice,” Robin said, sharply.  Tiffany couldn’t disagree, even though she knew that it was politically impossible.  “What happens when people start to die?”

He shook his head, one hand touching the sword at his belt.  “Did Lucas like his armour?”

Tiffany smiled.  She was glad of the change in subject.  “I believe that he accepted it,” she said, wryly.  Her own feelings were harder to fathom.  Lucas had deserved some reward for his efforts, even if they had been too late to save countless lives.  And yet…being the Black Knight wasn't really a reward, not when the wearers of the armour often came to unpleasant ends.  “Do you think he will wear it with pride?”

Robin shrugged.  “Tiffany,” he said, “why did he leave?”

He meant Merlin, Tiffany knew.  “I don’t know,” she admitted.  It was a bitter admission; Merlin hadn’t even told her, his First Councillor, that he intended to depart.  She’d been his most trusted ally and yet he hadn’t warned her of the coming crisis.  What had been running through his immensely ancient mind?  Had he been tiring of serving as immortal monarch to an empire that spanned the entire world, or had he been swept away by something much more powerful?  “I just don’t know.”

For a moment, she remembered the vision she’d had, back before Merlin had left and the Iron Palace collapsed to rubble.  She’d been naked, on her knees, chained hand and foot, and looking up with hopeless eyes.  Tiffany would have liked to dismiss it, yet every time she remembered it, the haunting image of her older self’s eyes chilled her to the bone.  Merlin had said that such visions were only probabilities, at best, and yet…

She wrapped her arms around Robin, taking comfort in his presence.  One thought dominated her mind.  The worst was yet to come.

***
Maledict staggered and fell to his knees in the mud, cursing the rain falling from the darkened sky.  It took all of his remaining strength to pull himself back to his feet, slipping and sliding in the muddy ground.  Water ran down from above, washing away at his footing; he stumbled and fought to remain upright.  Something was calling him onwards, yet he couldn’t tell who – or what – was calling for him.

Lightning flashed and he winced as the world was suddenly illuminated in chillingly bright light.  He covered his eyes, realising that whatever had happened in those final desperate moments at the Watchtower had restored his human form, at least for a few hours.  Or was it days?  Once, he’d been able to keep track of time easily, without effort.  Now…now he had no idea how much time had passed since he’d escaped the Watchtower and reappeared…here.  Where was here?

The rain poured down harder, leaving him struggling to keep moving.  His entire body was bent and old, the damage he’d inflicted on it with dark sorcery finally catching up with him.  Only his indomitable determination to survive and triumph kept him moving forward, staggering up the hill.  He would return to wreak his revenge, he promised himself.  This time, it would all be different.  There would be no lust for power over the empire, over the teeming millions who flocked over the world, merely their destruction at his hands.  He would shatter their cities and towns, sending them fleeing into a countryside that would provide no refuge for the huddled masses.  Maledict spat into the wind as he pressed against it and finally stumbled onto the top of the hill.  High overhead, he could see the moon shining down upon him.

High above, the lightning flashed again.  This time, he saw a set of huge standing stones, erected centuries before Merlin had started to create his empire.  He knew, instantly, where he had to be; indeed, he was surprised that he hadn’t realised earlier.  Somehow, heedless of myths and legends that warned all good folk to stay away from Mordred, he staggered into the circle of stones and collapsed right at the centre.  Below him, he could feel a trickle of ancient power slipping up towards the surface.  There were ancient stories of those who had touched the Great Old Ones in their eternal rest under the surface of the world, but Maledict had never cared for such cautionary tales.  Drawing on his remaining power, he reached down to the source and pulled…

The ground shook.  Slowly, one by one, the great standing stones began to collapse.  Maledict couldn’t have moved to save his life, even when one of them came down right next to him.  The shaking only grew worse as bright light started to flare up from underground, pulsing in time to the shakes passing through the earth.  Maledict cringed back as the light grew brighter and finally burst out of the ground, revealing a pale hand reaching towards the sky.  The shock somehow invigorated him and he managed to crawl to his feet, knowing that it was already too late to run.  There was a final burst of light and the figure rose up from the ground, drifting into the air.

Maledict slowly lifted his eyes to meet her.  She was pale, her skin as pale as a swan’s feathers.  Her black hair seemed to have a life of its own, caressing her face and shoulders as she slowly turned to look upon her savoir.  She was naked, yet there was no hint of vulnerability or even human sexuality.  Her body was inhumanly perfect, too perfect.  Raw power beat upon the air as she smiled, revealing that even Merlin could not have destroyed her.  In hindsight, some of the legends that were only communicated in whispers had barely scratched the truth.  Merlin had locked up ancient powers he could not destroy…and now one of them was free.  Maledict realised, as she slowly focused on him, that his hopes – barely expressed – of tapping her power for himself were futile.  She was so far beyond him that only her indifference could keep him safe.

Her dark eyes met his and he froze.  He could feel her peering into his mind, ransacking every last corner for knowledge about the world she’d re-entered.  There was no point in even trying to fight, not against such power.  He could barely think as her power lifted him into the air and held him in front of her, studying her with the same casual unconcern he’d studied the dying when he’d sacrificed them to the Darkness.  For all of his power, he was nothing more than a fly to her…

She laughed and Maledict’s world came apart around him.  His Sight, in his final seconds, expanded far beyond anything he’d ever known.  It showed him a vision; it showed him who she had been, who she was and what would happen, now that she was free.  Her power shimmered out upon the air; all over the world, children awoke screaming, unable to say what had snapped them out of their rest.  Every magician shuddered, although even the most subtle magic would be unable to identify why until it was far too late…

…And, in the Greenwood, creatures long forgotten knew that their time had come.

And then Maledict knew no more.

END OF PART ONE

THE STORY WILL CONTINUE IN

THE QUEEN OF NIGHTMARES

AND CONCLUDE IN

THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING.

Appendix: Merlin's World

Merlin deliberately designed the governmental system for stability.  Reasoning that it would be impossible for anyone to remove him from power, he was free to experiment and channel the forces of reform and reaction in any way he chose.  The results were fairly successful.

The centre of Merlin's Empire is Camelot, a city located in Britain.  Camelot itself takes the form of a triangle, with three smaller buildings concentrated around the Iron Palace.  (Iron is a major symbol of Merlin's power, as – unlike most supernatural creatures – he has no vulnerability to cold iron).  The Iron Palace is Merlin's domain, and the home of his trusted allies and confidants.  Surrounding the palace are the Houses of Parliament (Lords, Commons and Magus), the Keep (which serves as the centre of civil government) and the Great College of Beneficence.  Further afield, there are churches, aristocratic mansions and the Garrison, which serves as the military HQ.

Merlin's Privy Council serves as his direct representatives.  The Council is headed by the First Councillor (appointed by Merlin) and includes representatives from the military, magicians, the three Houses of Parliament and a handful of others.  

The principle law-enforcing arm of Merlin's Empire are the Knights of the Round Table.  The Knights are selected at fourteen years old and trained extensively in tactics, strategy and magic before they are granted the white-gold armour of a Knight.  The Knights possess vast authority, which they use at Merlin's behest.  There are only six hundred Knights at any one time, but they tend to burn out young and either take up training posts or are assigned to serve as civil governors – if they survive their service.  The failed aspirants to Knighthood are often brought into the Garrison and serve as common soldiers.  The Garrison has an official strength of 200'000 men, deployed around the world in small units, keeping the peace and intimidating uppity aristocrats.  This number may seem surprisingly small for its role, but even the common soldiers are supremely well-trained and supported by combat magicians – and, as a last resort, they are backed by Merlin's magic. 

More covertly, there is the Tribunal.  The  Tribunal is effectively Merlin's secret service, a force composed (largely) of magicians whose main task is to watch for any signs of dark sorcery and stamp it out by any means necessary.  Unlike the Knights, who are loved and respected throughout the land, the  Tribunal is feared and hated.  Its operations are shrouded in secrecy and only come to light when they bring a suspect to trial in front of Merlin or the House of Magus.

It is difficult to describe the remainder of the empire in simple terms, as it varies sharply from place to place.  The larger part of the empire's land surface is controlled by the Lords (feudal magnates, whose ancestors either surrendered to Merlin's forces or who were appointed to control the newly-conquered territories after their previous masters were removed).  The Lords possess vast power, but they are curbed by Merlin's willingness to enforce his edicts with colossal force.  It is worth noting that the Lords also command considerable private armies, each one used to secure their own position against peasant uprisings, rebellious magicians and the occasional outbursts of fratricide.

A large number of cities exist as 'free cities,' with a very different style of government.  The first free cities were deliberately modelled on Ancient Rome, with republican forms of government.  Others, later, were effectively run by the merchants, who make up the empire's middle class.  The free cities have a long tradition of taking in escaped serfs from the aristocratic estates (which infuriates the Lords), although they don't always give everyone the vote.  They also provide homes to magicians who do not wish to swear loyalty to any of the aristocrats, although this policy has sometimes backfired.  At least one city was devastated when an over-ambitious magician summoned a very dangerous and powerful creature out of the Darkness, which promptly broke loose, killed the fool who called it and ran rampant through the city until it was finally banished back to the Darkness by a team of combat magicians.

Possession of a noble title automatically allows the holder a seat in the House of Lords.  The senior member of a Great Family holds the family title; the lesser members of his (or her, rarely) are generally addressed as Lord Whoever, at least until they inherit).  The Patriarch is generally assumed to wield the votes of his family, although this isn't always the case.  The House of Lords can, with Merlin's consent, vote to strip a misbehaving aristocrat of his title.  Succession is generally in order of seniority, although a number of Lords have reached their positions by murdering their superiors.  Merlin quietly encourages this, on the grounds that it keeps them from plotting against him – or, more practically, the free cities.

There is no automatic right to a vote in Merlin's Empire.  A voter must be of full human descent (half-humans, regardless of their legacy, rarely get to vote) and possess a certain income or property qualification.  Needless to say, the Lords manipulate this system within their territory, with the net result that there are very few voters in the aristocratic lands.  The free cities have different rules, with some granting universal franchise, others granting it to taxpayers only, or to people born within the city.  People who are eligible to vote are allowed to vote for MPs standing for election to the House of Commons.  Serving MPs have considerable rights – they are, for example, exempt from the duelling code – and many remain in power for decades.

The third House of Parliament, the House Magus, is composed of senior magicians.  They have jurisdiction over magical law, both governing magicians practicing within the empire and trade and relations with magical creatures.  

Each of the Houses of Parliament has the right to initiate legislation, with the House of Lords as the senior House.  However, the other two houses have considerable power to slow down passage of unpopular acts - and Merlin, of course, has an ultimate veto.

'Magician' is the general term for any magic-user.  'Hedge-witch/wizard' represents the lowest form of practitioner, often barely trained.  'Wizard' represents a magician who has trained at Beneficence, Oxford, Cambridge, Salem or any of the other great magical colleges.  'Sorcerer' represents a magician who has used magic to force open newer and more powerful channels for magic in his mind.  This process is immensely dangerous and death – or madness – is a common result.  A maddened sorcerer becomes extremely powerful and extremely dangerous.  They – and necromancers, demon-worshippers and a handful of other forms of dark magic – are classed as 'dark sorcerers' and targeted for elimination.  The Tribunal is charged with hunting them down and destroying them.

As a general rule, women are not encouraged to study magic – although there is a long tradition of hedge-witches/wise women – and men make up most of the magicians in the empire.  Hybrids often tend to have strange magical talents that don't quite breed true – and they often go mad.  The Tribunal has a long history of terminating hybrids on general principles.

The dominant religion within the empire is Catholic Christianity, which is centred around Rome and Jerusalem.  There are a number of spin-off sects that are generally tolerated.  A handful of religions that worship the Old Gods (Odin, Zeus, etc) are not tolerated.  The various Popes have been ambient at best about collaborating with the devil's son (believing, correctly, that Merlin had been intended to be the antichrist), but generally accept that they don't have much choice.  There are monasteries scattered throughout most of the world, which recruit children for training as priests and nuns, with the intention of having a church and a priest in every village.  The Vatican itself is splintered into various factions, including some that believe that peaceful coexistence with magical creatures is possible and others that believe that magical creatures are all spawns of Satan and must be exterminated.  The Lords have been known to manipulate the religious officials appointed to their lands, using them to preach the value of servitude and the evils of rebellion.  It probably isn't surprising that the free cities take a dim view of organised religion and serve as recruiting grounds for dissident sects.

There is a strong feeling within the Church that all forms of human-controlled magic are evil and should be generally discouraged or stamped out.  The Church deploys its own magicians, however; the Order of White Magicians (which serves to investigate supernatural events) and the Lay Brothers of Christ (who serve to oppose dark magicians (which the Church interprets to mean any human with intrinsic magical powers).  Both Orders prefer to work through higher creatures (angels and lower servants of God) rather than develop their own powers.  Their detractors claim that there is little difference between talking to angels and talking to demons (if indeed they ARE talking to demons) and that the Church's tame magicians are equally damned.

Apart from humanity, there are a number of other magical creatures in this world.  Werewolves are largely confined to Lycanth (southern Germany, in our world), which serves as their reservation.  They have internal autonomy and representation at Merlin's Court.  Outside Lycanth, werewolves are feared and hated.  Dragons mainly occupy Dragoria (Scandinavia) under the terms of a treaty with Merlin.  As only a tenth of dragon children grow into intelligence, many of the remaining unintelligent babies are handed over to the Garrison to serve as an air force, of sorts).  The blood of intelligent dragons is very useful for magical potions and spells, so thousands of dragon-hunters try their luck every year.  Most of them end up eaten by the dragons, but the handful of successful hunters remain a sore point between the dragons and humanity.  Many of them choose to avoid humans, or to attack humans in  Dragoria on sight.  Internally, dragons are individualistic to a very high degree; few dragons ever need anything from another dragon.  If they were to unite politically, they would pose a significant threat to humanity's dominance of the world.  There are humans who believe that the only reason the dragons haven't united is because they would still be no match for Merlin.

Mermen and Mermaids can be found right across the world, living within the oceans and freshwater lakes.  They tend to be uninterested in anything other than fun and games – they're not top of the food chain in their natural environment – and often play tricks on humans entering the waters.  Mermaid music is universally considered to be awful – and some Mermaids, with magical talents, become Sirens and lure sailors to their doom.  Mermaids outnumber Mermen five to one, hence Mermen generally have multiple wives.

The vast majority of magical creatures are confined to their own lands through the boundary lines Merlin imposed, nearly a thousand years ago.  These range from Gorgons, Banshees and Brownies to creatures that are far more dangerous.  Humans who cross the boundary lines are their rightful prey, as far as they are concerned, and they hate and fear Merlin because he shattered the old lines that determined their place in the natural order of things.  The most powerful of those creatures provided the inspiration for many of the stories of gods and demons that were whispered from person to person in the darkness, before Merlin arrived to separate them from most of humanity.  Their hatred for humanity is matched only by their fear of crossing the devil's son.