Hour of Need tlom-6 Read online

  The electrical demon was unaffected. The pipe passed straight through and caught the wire, rebounding wildly before Caroline could bring it under control, but by then the creature had reached out and grasped it. Instantly, it flowed into the metal, its form melting like butter in sunshine. It dissolved from the antenna wire, crackled along the length of the pipe and Caroline was enveloped in a spitting, hissing radiance, an electrical cloak that made her jerk wildly before her eyes rolled back in her head. The pipe fell from her grasp and she slid to the tarred roof. A malevolent nimbus spluttered around her as she lay still.

  Aubrey was running before he knew it. Without slowing, he plucked his penknife from his pocket and slashed at the wire ahead of him. Naturally, since it was under tension, it sprang apart and whipped past his face. He raced after it, caught the end and coiled the wire until he reached the edge of the roof where he slashed again, tucking fifty feet of wire under one arm.

  Spells came to his lips – affinity spells, amplification spells. Coldly, he merged them together, opting for expediency and power over elegance.

  The electrical glow had left Caroline’s inert body and it had leaped back to the antenna wire, where it was reassembling itself into a demon. It swayed for a moment, then it hummed along the wire.

  Aubrey swivelled in time to see it vault to the next wire, speed along to the other end, then leap across to the next, coming one step closer. He was clearly its new target.

  Tiny imps of sparklets were gathered up and incorporated as it hummed from one wire to the next, careering from end to end then crossing, growing larger as it crackled its way toward him. Waiting for it, Aubrey’s mouth was dry but his mind was clear. He cast the coil of antenna wire over the parapet while he held the loose end in his right hand. When the coil hit the ground, he ran through the spell that made sure it buried itself in the soil, and he paid out enough wire so that he had three or four yards at his feet, all the while refusing to notice the way his heart was thumping. Fear was knocking at the door, but he declined to answer.

  The electrical demon crossed to the wire that Aubrey was standing next to. It didn’t hesitate. In a shower of sparks, it screamed along the antenna, sizzling toward him with its arms outstretched.

  Aubrey spat out a spell. He swung the wire in a flat plane above his head, slowly at first, then faster and faster, whirling until it whistled. When the electrical demon was barely ten feet away, he let go. Thanks to the spell, the wire hurtled at the creature, struck, then wrapped itself around its torso, tightening like a maddened python and sending a cascade of sparks into the air.

  Balanced on the wire only a few feet away, the electrical demon started to squeeze free, but Aubrey was ready for it. He delivered the other half of the spell with venom.

  The demon stopped its frenzied wriggling. For an instant, it propped on the wire and tilted its head to the heavens. In defeat? Resignation? Before Aubrey could ponder this moment of terminal cognisance, the demon elongated, then compressed – as if a giant had placed hands top and bottom and were using it as an accordion. With a thud and a whistle, the demon vanished, leaving the antenna wire vibrating. The entrapping wire came alight, crackling with blue fire, a glowing serpent in the night, then it fell to the roof, inert.

  The demonic creature had been earthed. Grounded. Defeated.

  Aubrey raced to where Caroline lay, slashing antenna wires with his knife to allow his passage. He paused to check that she was breathing, then he scooped her up and fairly danced across the mangled antenna array, not putting a foot wrong. Without a thought he held her over his shoulder and entered the hatch, descending the stairs with the surefootedness of an alpine creature much given to spending its life on near-vertical cliffs.

  He hurried to the oval table, at war with himself. Part of him wanted to despair, but he was Caroline’s hope and he couldn’t afford the dramatics.

  Her eyes were still closed. Her breathing was shallow and ragged. He touched her throat to find that her pulse was thready, erratic, and he felt the insidious brush of panic. He glanced at her dear hands to see them reddened and burned.

  Concentrate! he told himself. Time for namby-pambiness later!

  He extended his magical awareness. The creature had been electrical in its nature, but it had also had something magnetic as well, all bound together with magic. The residue was familiar – it had the taint he had detected in Caroline’s headphones, and he knew, then, that this creature was responsible for the interference in the ether.

  It had left its touch on Caroline. Many of her normal functions were being overwhelmed. Soon, she would be lost – unless he could perform some delicate medical magic.

  Aubrey had a tendency to throw himself into gaps, wherever they occurred. He had a desire to do the right thing, even at personal cost. But medical magic? He was only too aware of the hazards. No matter how robust Caroline’s constitution was, the human body was a complex construction. He could do untold harm.

  In a decision that took less than a heartbeat, he decided that inaction here was worse than action. A world without Caroline was unthinkable.

  Restoration and strengthening. He’d start there. Dimly remembered lectures came to him, masters at Stonelea mumbling about medical magic and emphasising that it should be left to trained practitioners. Dons at Greythorn insisting that the human body had a remarkable system for repairing itself, but sometimes needed help.

  He called on the Law of Origins and the Law of Constituent Parts. Medical magic didn’t substantially derive from these, but Aubrey was groping in the dark. He used what he knew best. The Law of Completeness. The Law of Intensification. Soon, he had a conglomerate spell with elements threaded together and supporting each other, combining to create what he hoped would keep Caroline Hepworth from dying.

  Kneeling at her side, he pronounced the spell slowly, despite the urgency. He wanted to get this right – he needed to get this right. If sincerity made spells more puissant, then Caroline would be up and walking in no time.

  He finished, hesitating a little over his signature element. Then he anxiously studied the face of the person who mattered.

  Many people mattered to him. George. His parents. Even his grandmother. He’d come to understand, however, that Caroline Hepworth mattered to him in a way unlike the others. Her existence affected him in a thousand different ways. Through all of his self-consciousness, through all his doubting and second-guessing, he knew that she made him happy.

  Her eyelids moved a little, but remained closed. He chewed at his lip. When her breathing become more even, more regular, he was glad he was kneeling, for he was sure his legs would have given way if he’d been standing.

  He bathed her hands and bound them with bandages, taking his time, waiting for her to open her eyes. When she lapsed into sleep, he covered her with a blanket, where she lay on the table, and he woke George and Sophie.

  39

  Through the small hours of the night, Aubrey tended to Caroline.

  After sharing what he knew with George and Sophie, they helped him move her downstairs to her own sleeping cubicle. After that, Aubrey remained seated on a three-legged stool by her side as she slept an uneasy sleep. Twice she called out, without opening her eyes, making him start, and once she made jerky, warding-off motions with her bandaged hands. Risking personal injury, he took her wrists and held them firmly. She resisted, but only for a moment, before subsiding, muttering words that were ill-formed and unintelligible.

  After breakfast had been served to the Enlightened Ones, Sophie parted the curtain and slipped in with a mug of tea for him and quiet concern for Caroline. She left, after patting him on the shoulder. He closed his eyes and brought the mug to his lips to savour it before tasting.

  Caroline spoke. ‘If I ask politely, may I have some tea as well?’

  It nearly precipitated a disaster. Aubrey’s eyes sprang open, he gasped and he tried to leap to his feet, all at once, while holding a container of extremely hot liquid. He swayed, wobbled,
righted himself, then stared at his patient.

  Her face was wan, but her smile was reassuring. She held up a hand, studied it, then put both hands together. Aubrey had done his best, but the bandages had made her elegant hands into bulky, gauze-laden mittens. ‘It appeared from nowhere,’ she said softly.

  ‘You were checking the antenna?’

  ‘I received some communication, then the interference was worse. I thought I might need to realign something.’

  ‘It was magic.’

  ‘Dr Tremaine?’

  ‘Or a magician underling. I can imagine it patrolling the ether and doing its best to ruin communications.’

  ‘And tracking down the source.’ Gingerly, she sat up. ‘I feel bruised all over.’

  ‘Your hands were burned. I did what I could.’

  She held one out. ‘Let me see.’

  ‘I’m not sure that’s a good idea.’

  ‘I have more medical training than you, Aubrey. I have to assess what needs to be done.’

  ‘Are they painful?’

  ‘Somewhat. You didn’t put butter on them or anything like that, did you?’

  ‘George advised against it. He said it was folklore of a bad kind.’

  ‘He was correct.’

  As carefully as he could, Aubrey began unwinding the gauze. She winced. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m being as gentle as I can.’

  She favoured him with an expression that was equal parts exasperation and the sort of tenderness that made him melt. ‘You’re doing a fine job.’

  ‘There.’

  Caroline brought her hand up close. She turned it over to complete her inspection. ‘No blisters, which is a good thing. Red and sore, but no real damage.’

  ‘I’m glad.’

  ‘As long as I don’t have to engage in a serious tug-of-war in the next day or so, I should be able to manage.’

  She began to pick away at the other bandage. Aubrey leaned over to help and, naturally, this brought their heads close together. Intent on working on Aubrey’s awkward bandage knot, she leaned so her forehead rested against his, which he thought an arrangement extremely close to perfection.

  Some time later – hours? days? – she straightened and tossed the bandage to him. ‘Now, what about that cup of tea?’

  40

  Caroline was a model of patience as she explained successively to Sophie, then George, then Hugo, who had darted back to the base to fetch a piece of equipment needed by the Enlightened Ones, that she was, indeed, well and that while she appreciated their concern she wasn’t about to take to her bed and become a valetudinarian.

  George and Sophie went off to work on another article they were writing together. After waiting for Aubrey to make repairs to the antenna array and after listening to his warning to keep the time on air brief, Caroline tested the wireless. Her scowling told Aubrey the situation before her words did. ‘I still can’t get through.’

  Aubrey gazed upward, through the wooden floor of the factory, through the roof, and chewed his lip. ‘I’d hoped that disposing of that creature might have freed the air.’

  ‘If one was made, then more would have been.’

  ‘Not necessarily true. If the spell was enormously complex, the cost could be too great. But Dr Tremaine has organised his spellcasting, systematising and delegating it. Distributed spellcasting?’

  Caroline closed the wooden door of the telegraph cubicle. She linked her arm with his and led the way to the stairs. ‘You always say that Dr Tremaine is the foremost magician of our age.’

  ‘He wouldn’t have been appointed Sorcerer Royal if he wasn’t, not with his background.’

  ‘It seems to me, however, that it’s not just his spells that are revolutionary, if that’s correct.’

  ‘His spells are staggeringly innovative.’

  Caroline let go of Aubrey’s arm and sat at the oval table. She played with a brush, one of the props they were using to make the place look like a real bookbinder’s workplace. At the other end of the large, open space, near a sunny window, Sophie was using a typing machine while George was scribbling with a pencil. ‘I’m guessing that Dr Tremaine is doing more than inventing innovative spells,’ Caroline said. ‘He’s also changing the way magic is done. He’s like that motorcar manufacturer, the one who’s broken the process into its individual parts and changed his whole factory to that end.’

  ‘Rivers? Harold Rivers?’

  ‘That’s the one. His mass production has meant that motorcars are rolling out of his factories at an unheard of rate.’

  ‘But we’re talking about magic, not machines.’

  ‘Aubrey, I may know nothing about magic, but I can see systems at work. I have the distinct impression that Dr Tremaine is working on that level as well as the coalface of spell casting.’

  Aubrey had never felt that he was the sole repository of good ideas. ‘I think you may be right, but the implications scare me.’

  ‘They scare me as well, which is why we have to stop him.’

  41

  The next day, after a messenger arrived at the base with news of the arrival of their special delivery, Sophie prepared her story for Claude to take – but she couldn’t resist giving the earnest young newspaperman last-minute advice as they accompanied him. He was dressed in his best suit, no doubt hoping to make an impression when he reached Lutetia, but Sophie reassured him that the editors would be more interested in his news than in his fashion sense.

  After they donned civilian clothes to minimise attention, and with Claude directing, George drove the wagon he’d bought to the riverfront a hundred yards from the collapsed railway bridge. The busyness on the docks had the vitality of old. The river was jammed with all manner of craft ferrying people and goods from one side to the other, where Aubrey could see the steam and smoke from a train that had just pulled up on the far bank. Claude ignored the touts who were offering to buy and sell anything he had and instead led them a distance upriver to where a barge was being loaded with crates of apples.

  ‘Henri is my cousin’s best friend,’ Claude said, introducing them to the captain. He was nearly as venerable as the craft he was in charge of, but his back was straight and his eyes were bright. A stubby pipe was jammed in the corner of his mouth. ‘He can be trusted.’

  ‘Trusted?’ Captain Henri said in heavily accented Albionish, made all the more obscure by his not removing his pipe. ‘Of course I can be trusted. What have you been telling these young people? That I am a pirate?’

  ‘We have a shipment waiting for us on the other side,’ Aubrey said. ‘A dozen large crates. You’ll be able to manage them?’

  Captain Henri took his pipe from his mouth and pointed it at the crate-loading. ‘Lothar and Volker are made of muscle.’

  The two deckhands were indeed mountains of men. One, blond haired, had stripped off his shirt in the sun, either because he was hot or because his mother had grown tired of sewing up the seams after he burst them. The other was the more muscular of the two.

  ‘Lothar?’ Aubrey said. ‘Volker? Aren’t they Holmlandish names?’

  Captain Henri laughed. ‘Of course. Holmlandish names for Holmlanders.’

  George broke the uncomfortable silence that followed this announcement. ‘Your deckhands are Holmlanders?’

  ‘They are and have been all their life.’

  ‘Even though we’re at war with Holmland?’

  Captain Henri scowled around his reinserted pipe. ‘These fellows have been with me for years. I vouch for ’em.’

  Claude cut in anxiously. ‘We are close to the border here. We have always mixed, Gallians that way, Holmlanders this way. When the war was declared, most went home, but not all.’

  ‘Those boys don’t care about rich men in Fisherberg playing games with young men’s lives,’ Captain Henri said. ‘Now, you want your shipment or not?’

  Claude promised that he’d see the crates safely stowed before he departed on the train. Some last-minute instructions from Sophie and
he was off, leaping from the dock to the barge as it pulled away.

  While they waited, George and Sophie wandered along the riverbank and bought some very savoury goat’s milk cheese, bread, a basket of pears and two bottles of fresh milk, thus pleasing the deckhands they bought from, who thereby had less to load, the barge captains, who grinned at the cash transaction, not to mention Aubrey and Caroline, who were the beneficiaries of this scavenged but delightful luncheon.

  They sat under a pin oak that spread its branches wide, and they watched the commerce of the river and its banks while they passed Aubrey’s penknife and the cheese to each other. Aubrey insisted on cutting Caroline’s bread and cheese for her and remarkably – after a minor show of refusing – she accepted his help.

  Aubrey was thinking of a dozen things at once, as was his wont, but he found time to notice how close Sophie and George were sitting to each other. Sophie had her legs folded up, with her striped skirt neatly draped around her. She wore a straw hat bravely perched on her head as she pointed out to George what he was missing in the bustle below.

  Then he realised that Caroline and he were sitting just as close. He swallowed nervously and went to apologise but she hushed him with a twitch of one eyebrow.

  ‘Just sit back,’ she said. ‘Enjoy the moment.’

  He did and he wished it would go on forever.

  42

  When they finished their lunch, George manoeuvred the wagon down from the road to the dockside with Sophie on the driver’s seat beside him, wide-eyed but game.

  The crates were large, as promised, each about nine feet long. Lothar and Volker, grunting, loaded them with the aid of some imaginative swearing, an amalgam of Gallian and Holmlandish, Aubrey guessed, and the way they brought the languages together gave Aubrey hope for the future.