The Neon Court (41 page)

I held out my hand, smeared in dust and soot and blood. She looked at it with contempt. Then, ignoring me utterly, she levered herself to her feet, and looked at the darkness of the door. “What’s out there?” she asked.

“Dust,” I answered with a shrug. “And stuff.” I stepped into the corridor, looked back. She was still standing there.

“You don’t want to be lied to, huh?”

“I know if people lie,” she replied.

“Good. That’ll make this easier.” I ran my finger through the dust. “There’s something out here you’ve got to be scared of. And I am really, really trying to keep you alive.”

For a moment, we thought she wouldn’t come.

Then she did.

We walked together to the end of the corridor, to the foot of the stair. I fumbled in my pocket until my slippery fingers closed around the cold weight of my phone. I thumbed it on. “Dees!”

Our voice echoed and bounced away.

The stair seemed to have no top, no bottom.

“Dees!”

“Why you fucking shouting?” hissed the girl. “You dense, you’ll bring …” Her voice trailed off.

My phone came on. No signal.

I thought I heard feet run, further away, somewhere a long way off.

“Up,” I said. “We keep going up.”

“I’m not doing anything you say!”

“Sure. I’ll let you make up your own mind on this one,” I sighed. “But I’m going up no matter what happens, since up is where out is.”

I started to climb. She waited nearly two flights before following me, tutting and shaking her head like I was a reckless child, demanding my whims were indulged. Still no phone signal. Below us, something went
pop
. Then something else joined it, then another.

I leant out over the stairwell and looked down.

Beneath us, one at a time, heading from the bottom up, the lights were going out.

I almost found myself wishing for Bakker.

Then a voice overhead said, “Nearly there!” I looked up. Bakker was
leaning out over the railing, staring down. “But will you make it in time?” he called, voice echoing away.

I grabbed JG by the sleeve, dragged her upstairs. She came, struggling to pull her arm free but still running, bright enough for that at least. The darkness kept on rising, pop, pop, pop the little snapping sound of the little white bulbs in the tight dark stairwell going out. The dust was slippery beneath our feet, puffing up in little beige clouds as we climbed.

“Dees!” I shouted again. “Dees, get your arse here now!” The darkness was five floors below; three. Then it hit us and I ducked as the lamp overhead burst and went out in a shower of glass. I caught a sliver of light between my fingers as it went out, tossed it over my head and everything here was so slow, the power so distant. We kept climbing upwards, even now as the darkness overtook us, rose up over our heads, snuffing out light after light until all that seemed to remain was the pinprick of a distant star, and then even those stars started to go out. I rounded another stair, turned another corner and she was right there, my little bubble of light was too dim to see her clearly but she was right there, Oda standing on the stair above me and she kicked out, knocking me backwards straight into JG, sending me tumbling back into the corner of the landing. Her shoulders were shaking, her fist closed tight around Theydon’s bloody glass sword, her face set in mute rage. I heard JG gasp and shy back, covering her face instinctively with her hands, heard the air part and threw up my hands, unleashing a blast of electricity that crackled its way through the air slow and sluggish, slamming into Oda’s chest and throwing her backwards. JG screamed, the high-pitched scream of someone who’s watched too much TV and knows that’s what you do under these circumstances, and I drew my fists back and dragged out what little heat was left in my soul and threw another blast at Oda even as she staggered upright, then another, knocking her to her knees. The clothes on her back were smoking. We crawled onto our feet and, as she tried to rise, forced out another blast. The effort nearly knocked us flat again, the dust filling our eyes as the air parted around us, but it hit Oda in the heart and she clasped her fists to her chest and seemed to rock back, head snapping up to the ceiling. I drew my hands back for another, last shot, and Bakker’s voice was beside me, around me, in me,
shouting “Matthew, no!” and then there were arms around my neck, across my shoulder, and JG was screaming, “Don’t touch her! Don’t you fucking touch her!” and her weight propelled me backwards, knocking me off my feet and sending me sprawling back down to where I’d begun. I landed badly, barely aware of JG’s fists against my side, one leg caught under the other. I tried to crawl up and my arms were putty, my feet scrambling in the slippy dust. Oda was already back on her feet, heaving herself up, supported by Theydon’s stabbing sword.

Bakker was by me, hands gesturing uselessly in the air, unable to help me up, hissing, “You can’t kill her do you hear, you can’t kill her, you can’t win this you have to get out of here now!”

Oda was coming down the stairs, and there was nothing human, nothing merciful, in those not-eyes.

I felt for the phone in my pocket, wiped dust off the screen with the corner of my thumb, started to dial. Our fingers were shaking, exhausted from the effort of trying to throw Oda-Blackout back, and then she was there, pulling JG away from me by the scruff of her neck. I felt sharp cold glass in the hollow of my throat, and closed my eyes shut before the blood could begin to run out of them.

Then JG whispered, “Oda?”

And death failed to come.

I half opened my eyes. Oda was staring at JG, and JG was staring at Oda, and JG’s eyes were not bleeding. The two looking straight at each other and there wasn’t anger in Oda’s face, there wasn’t hate or fear but something I’d never quite seen before. JG reached out uneasily towards the other woman, hand shaking. “Oda?”

The blade drew back.

Oda seemed almost to smile.

Then JG saw her eyes, and screamed again, this time for real, an animal sound of distress and terror, and screamed and screamed and Oda drew away, covering her face with her arm, and the sword went back and

Something silver, burning, fast, rose up behind her and dug its silver teeth into Oda’s neck. Oda shrieked with pain, clawed at the thing wrapping itself around her, even as flame danced between them, and I saw a pair of mad red eyes.

“Dees!”

I tried to crawl to my feet, but Oda had got a grip somewhere on Dees’ metal skin and thrown her back, and was diving after her with blade in hand. “Dees!”

I saw claw break skin like skin was silk, and Oda didn’t even stop, didn’t slow, didn’t flinch, but drove Theydon’s glass blade into the middle of the silver-skinned Alderman with the sound of metal cracking and glass shattering. Fire flared in Dees’ eyes, and began to go out. The silver covering of her skin began to fade, her hair became charred human blonde, her fingers curled in pain, breath, human breath, shivered across her lips. Oda drew her hand back, and all she held was a glass hilt, the blade shattered into a thousand parts. I saw Dees stagger back, trip on the top stair, fall, press her hands to her belly in surprise, pick free from the bloody mess of it a shard of broken green glass, hold it up to the dim light. Her mouth opened in an “o” of horror, tears, half salt, half blood, welling up in her eyes. She whimpered, “But I … never said …”

The glass fell from her fingers.

“I … didn’t have … time to …”

She fell back on her elbows. Then on her back. Her feet dangled over the edge of the stairs, her head locked, staring bloody-eyed at the ceiling. Oda walked up beside her, stared down into her face. No more blood came from Dees’ eyes.

We stood up.

Our hand burnt.

We could feel the blood rolling out of the scars in our hand.

Bakker hissed, “Matthew …”

Oda turned, stared straight at us, and we stared back. We held up our hand towards her, and saw Oda flinch. “
Domine dirige nos
,” I whispered, tongue of leather, lips of sand. “
Domine dirige nos
.”

Fire flared, on our skin, in our blood, behind our eyes. It bloomed around us like ripples in a pond, the red mad dragon fire; it stretched out from the crosses in our palm and tumbled up, and out, and around, spilt over the corridor, slammed into Oda and sent her staggering back, shielding her not-eyes from it. It wasn’t hot, it wasn’t bright, but it was the dancing madness in the pit of the dragon’s eye, the dancing, unmentionable thing that had grown from a city built on the ruins of a city built on the ruins of the city, a thing fuelled by the embers of the
fires that had never quite gone out, fed by the bones of the bodies buried beneath the bodies buried beneath the bodies buried beneath the stones on which one day more bodies would be lain. I advanced up the stairs, legs moving without being asked, and Oda cowered back. I could see blood trickling from a thousand burns on her, see her lips cracking before the fire, I was level with Dees now, standing over the body of the Alderman, and we screamed, our voice, my voice, and another voice too, the one that had a lizard tongue and guarded the gates, “
Domine dirige nos!
”

And Oda shrieked, threw her arms back even as the fire tore away at her and shrieked, howled like a hurt dog, shrieked and shrieked and shrieked and then was, without any warning, laughing, hyena laugh, and the gesture I had taken for pain and terror was the open-armed joy of acceptance. And briefly I saw, beneath the wound in her chest, through the hole in her heart, a thing move underneath it, a liquid, living thing, not human, not bound to flesh, crawling its way free of hers.

Bakker roared, “You can’t kill it with fire!”

We faltered.

The fire flickered and began to die around us.

Our legs had no more strength to hold us.

Oda’s laughter died with the flames.

I flopped down to the floor next to Dees. Her blood was slow, thick in the dust. Bakker tried to grab me by the arms, hissing, whispering, “Get up you have to get up you have to go Matthew! You have to go now!”

Oda sank down against the wall opposite me, still shaking from laughter and pain. A body like that was dead, so much broken and torn and bloody, she was dead, a dead body and a thing beneath it and …

“Matthew!” Bakker was pawing at the phone still clutched in my left hand. “The more you destroy her, the more powerful it becomes! Matthew! You have to go now!”

I turned the phone, peered at the screen. A single grey bar of signal sat, wobbling and weak, in the top left-hand corner.

I found I still had a thumb. It dialled, one number at a time, each little digit a triumph of concentration. Oda tensed as she saw the thing in my hand, tried to get up, slipped, tried again, crawled on hands and
knees towards me, reaching out for it. I found the last number, rolled with a grunt of pain onto my side and slipped feet first down the stairs. Oda’s hand snapped at the air where I’d been, I heard her hiss of rage. JG was huddled in a corner, hands wrapped around her head, shaking, sobbing, frozen in place. I saw Oda stagger to her feet, reaching out towards us. “No,” she gasped. “No, give me the girl, Matthew! Give me the girl you have to give me …”

My finger found the dial button, my hand pressed the phone to a far-off object that might have been my ear. Oda launched herself, screaming, “Give me the …!”

A voice on the other end of the line said, “Matthew?”

“Get us the hell out of …”

The universe went bye-bye.

I smelt soy sauce.

It cut through all other smells, sharp and rich and bright.

So far so good. I risked opening one eye.

The light outside was too bright, so I closed it again for a while to reconsider my position.

My position was horizontal, belly down, on a hard floor.

It seemed as good a place as any, so I stayed there a while.

Bakker said, somewhere not far off enough, “Time is wasting, Matthew.”

I groaned.

This seemed to attract more attention. I heard footsteps, felt air move. Then Penny’s voice was by me and she was blurting, “Bloody hell are you all right I mean obviously you’re not all right you look like a fucking bulldozer has been using you for practice and getting it wrong but I guess what I’m asking is, are you bleeding internally?”

I risked opening my eyes again. Somewhere in front of the brightness, a hair-shrouded blob that might have been Penny’s face shifted in and out of focus. I coughed dust and ash that scratched all the way up. I crawled onto my elbows, and mumbled, “Hi Penny.”

“Bleeding internally?” she repeated.

“Is there some easy way of checking?” I asked.

“I just kinda assumed you’d know.”

I risked looking a little further.

I was sprawled on a plain concrete floor in a room full of boxes. The boxes said in several languages, ‘Finest Fortune Cookies; Export Only’. Someone had cleared a space in the middle of this floor and laid out, in a clear and careful magical circle, hundreds and hundreds of first-class postage stamps. Some of them were still smoking now. I prodded one with the end of my finger. It crumbled into dust at the touch. I said, “Jesus, how much postage and packing did you use?”

“You said you needed rescuing!”

I managed to make it into an upright sitting position, and lingered there. “It’s a recorded delivery,” I explained. “You’re supposed to use an equal postage relative to the mass of the object being delivered. You’ve got enough stamps in this damn summoning circle to summon the ghost of Orson Welles and a five-course meal.”

“I did work out the masses!” she replied. “It’s not my fault you’re a weird skinny freak!”

“The Post Office even issues a chart! Number of stamps relative to mass times distance of object being teleported …”

“But I did it, didn’t I?” she triumphed. “I mean, all by myself, your kick-ass apprentice, I like totally did it, a spell that most people can’t and I did it and I got it right and you’re here and safe and that’s what matters, see?”

Sweat glimmered out on her forehead, ran down her neck. Her hands were shaking, her grin wide and uncontrollable, eyes darting all over my face as if scanning for one muscle out of place.