In Your Dreams (15 page)

They did bump into a party of goblins, in the corridor leading to the fire door behind reception; but as soon as they saw Benny, they scowled and turned away. ‘They're no bother really, if you stand up to them,' Benny said cheerfully. ‘'Course, it helps if you're a dwarf, like me. We've got a lot of history with goblins, mostly stuff they'd prefer to forget. You get on,' he added, ‘it's my turn to lock up. See you tomorrow, then.'

As the door closed behind him, Paul felt an unusual surge of relief at being outside, in the normal, safe street. Mostly, being in the office didn't spook him any more, not the way it had done at first. He'd got used to it, like the people who build villages on the slopes of active volcanoes. This evening, however, had reminded him of just how flimsy the partition was between the monotonous daily routine and the stark terror of it all. A bit like being an estate agent in a war zone.

It was only when he'd got home and was defrosting a frozen pizza for dinner that he suddenly realised what had been preying on his mind, ever since he'd woken up from his dream. He darted across to the bookshelf and pulled down Sophie's copy of the office-procedures manual. At the back, just before the index, was a page that he'd flicked past without reading several times. He found it, ran his finger down the list of names till he came across the entry for the chapters he'd glanced at earlier –

EFFECTIVE MAGIC by Otto Nijsbakker, Contessa Judith di Castel'Bianco, Professor Kajikawa Yosobie & Dr Ernest Carpenter

Ernest Carpenter. Ernie Carpenter. Uncle Ernie.

Cohere
, Paul ordered himself.
Not the most uncommon name in the world. Probably – no, almost definitely someone else, a complete stranger
. Nevertheless; Uncle Ernie, whom he hadn't seen or heard about since he was a little kid. Not since he was at junior school, in fact. Hadn't his name come up in some conversation recently? He wasn't sure. He made a mental note to ask after him next time he heard from Mum and Dad, assuming he could get that many words in edgeways.

The microwave pinged; dinner was served. Paul slapped the pizza onto a plate, found a clean fork and knife, made himself a strong black coffee, switched the telly on and flopped down on the sofa. He'd apparently hit the news, but he couldn't be bothered to get up and change the channel. He munched pizza through various small wars and other melodramas, and was chasing a stray olive round the plate when he heard something that made him look up—

‘
. . . Reports just coming in of an explosion in the City of London.
' Shaky hand-held footage of a red glow behind silhouetted buildings; a fire engine, men with hoses. ‘
The blast wrecked offices in St Mary Axe, causing extensive damage, though as yet there are no reports of casualties.
' Paul jumped to his feet, dropping the plate and scattering fragments of pizza crust. Irritating helicopter shot, could be anywhere; then, unmistakable, the frontage of JWW. There was the brass plaque on the wall, but the door was gone and so was a large chunk of the masonry. ‘
Police have not yet commented on the cause of the explosion, but are not ruling out the possibility of terrorist involvement. Finally, Larry the ring-tailed lemur who escaped from London Zoo two days ago has been found after a—
'

Paul said something vulgar about Larry the lemur and switched the television off, thinking:
a bomb? Surely not.
A bolt of lightning, maybe, or even a direct hit from a fire-breathing dragon; but ordinary mundane old high explosive would be beneath the dignity of trade rivals, and nobody else knew who JWW were so why would they blow them up? Unless it was an accident; goblins having water-balloon fights with Benny Shumway's private stock of nitroglycerine, perhaps, or playing chicken with a gas main. Unless it really was a dragon, and the news people were just—

Then someone grabbed him from behind, and he felt claws digging into his neck.

Chapter Five

‘I
t's all right,' hissed a horrible voice in Paul's ear, as the claws bit into his skin. ‘Nobody's going to hurt you.'

Fibber
, Paul thought; but the grip was too tight to allow him to put his thoughts into words. He decided to hold very still indeed, and pass out as quickly as possible. On balance, if he had to die, he'd rather be asleep when it happened.

‘Mum,' said a voice in the distance, ‘not so tight, all right? They're fragile, you'll break it.'

The grip relaxed slightly, and Paul could feel something huge on his shoulder, turning him as though he was a page in a book. He'd closed his eyes when the pain was bad; now he opened them again. Injudicious. He shuddered.

‘
Mum!
'

‘It's no use saying “Mum“ at me like that,' said the horrible voice. ‘How do I make it stay still?'

‘Let it
go
, for God's sake. You're probably hurting it.'

‘Oh. Right.'

The thing, the hideous, terrifying,
ugly
thing, was huge, like a grizzly bear or a monster gorilla, but it wasn't any kind of creature that Paul had ever seen or heard about. Its skin was fish-belly white and coarse as sandpaper; its head was completely spherical, with slits for ears, eyes and mouth, and sat on top of a gross sack of a body like a golf ball balanced on a dollop of weightless custard. Paul could feel how very strong it was, but where it kept its muscles was anybody's guess. He didn't even bother trying to peer over its shoulder for a look at the owner of the other voice.

‘Mum.'

‘Sorry? Oh, yes.' The thing appeared to be concentrating, as if about to try something difficult. But it relaxed its grip a little, which was nice. ‘Now then, dear,' said the thing. ‘Can you understand what I'm saying?'

Dear
? ‘Yes,' Paul mumbled. ‘Um, who are you?'

‘See, Mum, I told you. They can understand everything we say.'

‘Yes, all right.' The thing frowned, a neat trick since it had no eyebrows. ‘Hello,' it said, then hesitated. Tongue-tied? A shy monster? ‘Now then, there's nothing to be frightened of, I'm not going to hurt you. Are you all right?'

‘Yes,' Paul gasped.

‘You won't try and run away or anything?'

Paul shook his head. ‘Promise,' he added.

‘All right,' the thing said, and let go of Paul's throat completely. He staggered back and landed in his chair, the one he'd been sitting in watching television before his life got all cluttered up with monsters. ‘That's right,' cooed the thing approvingly. ‘You settle down, and we'll have a nice chat. Would you like that?'

No
, Paul thought,
absolutely not.
‘Yes,' he said, feverishly maintaining eye contact. ‘That'd be great.'

‘See?' said the other voice smugly. ‘They're just like people, really.'

The thing didn't sit down, mostly because it had nothing – at least, nothing
specific
– to sit down with. Rather, it sort of coagulated on an area of carpet. ‘I hope we didn't startle you,' it said.

‘No, not at all,' Paul said.

‘That's all right, then. Now, I expect you're wondering who we are.'

Tact
, Paul thought. ‘Well, a bit,' he said.

The thing nodded. ‘I don't think we've actually met before.' Behind its shoulder, another round, featureless head bobbed politely. Paul tried to smile, but his face had gone numb. ‘We know you, of course, but you don't know us.'

‘Sorry,' Paul said, ‘but how do you know me? I mean, I'm not famous or anything.'

For a moment, Paul was sure the thing was about to bite him, but it was just a smile. Its teeth, he couldn't help noticing, were brown. ‘The thing is, dear,' it said, ‘we're here to help you. That's right, isn't it, pumpkin?'

‘That's right,' the other one said, which seemed to clear that up.

‘Good,' Paul said nervously. ‘How, exactly?'

The thing's face reshaped itself into a kind of soggy pout. ‘I'm afraid you're in great danger,' it said.

That, in Paul's view, was stating the obvious. ‘Oh yes?'

The thing nodded again. ‘We can't tell you very much, unfortunately, so you'll just have to take our word for it. But—' It was thinking again. ‘Well, you saw just now on your talking-box thing . . .'

A sigh from the middle distance. ‘Telegraph, Mum. They call them telegraphs.'

‘The place where you work,' the thing went on, ‘got blown up. Remember?'

‘Yes,' Paul said. He'd forgotten. Being strangled by nightmare monsters can do that to a person. ‘I saw it on the news.'

‘The what, dear?'

‘Sorry, the telegraph. There was a report about it.'

‘Well.' The thing appeared to have lost its thread. ‘Anyway, that explosion. It was in your room, the place where you sit all day. It was – I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but it was meant for you.'

‘Oh,' Paul said.

The thing's narrow yellow eyes clouded slightly. ‘It was a – what's the expression? A burbly-trap. Someone connected up the exploding thing to the handle of your big metal box for keeping things in, so that next time you opened it, you'd be blown up. But the goblins must've gone in your office and played with it, and set it off by accident.' The thing looked grave. ‘I'm very sorry,' it said. ‘This must be rather a shock for you.'

You betcha
, Paul thought. ‘Well, yes,' he said. ‘Um, can you tell me who did it?'

Now the thing was looking very sad. ‘I'd tell you if I knew,' it said. ‘But I'm afraid it was probably one of us. I'm so sorry,' it added. ‘But you see, some of us are very frightened.'

‘Frightened,' Paul repeated.

‘That's right. And when they're frightened, people can do some very silly things. It's this dreadful war,' it went on bitterly. ‘If we're not careful, it'll ruin everything. But they don't see that, of course. All they can think about is trying to beat the other side. Quite ridiculous, the whole thing.'

‘Excuse me,' Paul interrupted tentatively, ‘but what war?'

The thing looked shocked. ‘You don't know about the war?'

‘Sorry.'

‘Oh.' The thing pursed its palpable absence of lips. ‘They haven't told you about the war. Oh dear.'

‘It's all right,' Paul said. ‘They don't tell me anything. What war?'

‘The civil war,' said the thing wretchedly. ‘Us against them. Or really, us against us, which is why it's so sad. The point is,' it continued, lowering its voice, ‘we aren't doing at all well, and you – well, you're the hero, strictly speaking. Until the other hero gets back, the blond one with the nice eyes. So really, it's just self-defence. Well, self-defence in advance, anyhow. They wanted to get you before you got them, is what I'm trying to say. Do you understand?'

Paul dipped his head. ‘Sort of like a pre-emptive strike, you mean?'

‘A what, dear?'

‘You think the enemy's going to get you,' Paul explained, ‘so you get him first. Like Pearl Harbor, that sort of thing.'

‘Pearl what?'

‘This war,' Paul persevered. ‘Who's fighting who? And what's it got to do with me? I'm no threat to anybody, I can't even squash spiders.'

The thing looked gravely at him. ‘Now that's not quite true, is it?' it said reproachfully. ‘You're a Dragonslayer, I can smell its blood on your hands. At least,' it added thoughtfully, ‘I can smell its blood.'

‘A—' It sounded so
silly
, put like that. The thing had even pronounced the capital D. ‘It was an accident,' he said. ‘Honest. And I'm not a – what you said, I'm an assistant trainee.' He broke off. The thing was still gazing at him. ‘What?' he said. ‘Really and truly, it was an accident. Mr Tanner's mum—' His voice dried up. Goblins fooling about, she'd said; some goblins had opened the filing-cabinet drawer, and got themselves blown up. In which case, they'd be dead. And he knew a goblin; not that she was his friend, more like an unmitigated pest, but he knew her, and she couldn't be dead, could she? Things like that didn't really happen—

‘Until the nice-looking one gets back,' the thing was saying, ‘you're the senior hero in this area. And we're monsters,' she said sadly. ‘Which means it's your job to kill us, if someone comes along and asks to have one of us killed. And you slew the dragon—'

‘I
sat
on it, for pity's sake,' Paul protested.

The thing shook its head. ‘Doesn't make any difference,' it said. ‘But we haven't come here to argue, we just thought you ought to know. You're in danger, and so's your—' The thing's bleached skin coloured faintly pink. ‘Your female,' it said. ‘She's in deadly peril too.'

‘Oh,' Paul said; and realised that his first thought had been
Melze
. But. ‘Um,' he said, ‘which one?'

Now the thing looked shocked. ‘Sorry, dear?'

‘Which, um, female do you mean? Only . . .'

He knew that expression. ‘Oh,' it said. ‘My mistake. Only, I'd got the impression that humans mate for life. It says so in the encyclopedia.'

‘Ah.' Paul wilted slightly. ‘Well,' he said, ‘they're supposed to, I guess. But it doesn't always . . .'

‘I see.' The thing had no lips to purse, but pursed them anyway. ‘Well, anyway. I don't know which female they're on about, but I have it on very good authority that she's in terrible danger, and we thought you ought to know. And now we'd best be going.'

They were looking at him again. ‘Goodbye, dear,' said the Mum thing. ‘Do take care.' Then he felt as though he was falling through the air; which turned out to be true, though in the event he only fell a little way, from his chair to the floor. He opened his eyes.

‘Bugger,' he said.