Authors: Michael Pryor
They climbed straight up the outside of the structure.
Caroline went first, offering advice to both Aubrey and
George as they followed. She appeared to have no difficulty
with heights, and often hung from one hand as she
looked back to check their progress.
George climbed doggedly, muttering under his breath
each time he came to an obstacle that had to be skirted
or squirmed around.
Aubrey climbed a few yards away. A construction that
looked suspiciously like a miniature aqueduct appeared
just above him, emerging from the wall opposite and
disappearing into the depths of the labyrinth. Aubrey
hoisted himself up and found that it was, indeed, open
on the top and carried water. He added it to the list of
unbelievable things he'd recently seen.
Once on top of the structure, the going was easier.
Instead of lifting their own weight, all they had to do was
scramble on all fours. They had to work around any
pipes, wires or cables that thrust down from the ceiling
(or up from the mass below?) and they had to be sure
anything underfoot would bear their weight, but the
challenges were few.
Aubrey found himself staring downward as he went,
admiring the intricacy that resulted from the myriad
interconnections. At times he thought he could detect
movement, but he decided it could simply be water, or
one of the miniature barges Caroline had seen.
Caroline paused and glanced back quizzically. Heart
pounding, Aubrey nodded, then crawled until he could
see that she had reached a gap in the structure. He sought
the walls of the chamber and realised they'd reached the
centre of the immense meshwork. He found a good
foothold on what felt like a solid concrete beam and
gazed at the light that filled the gap.
He had to shade his eyes. The light was fierce, a flickering,
dancing radiance that licked upward like a bonfire
on Empire Night. Aubrey felt its power even at this
distance and it daunted him. It wasn't heat that battered
his skin, it was raw magical power, redolent with potential
– and a hint that was unmistakeably Dr Tremaine.
Gritting his teeth, he crawled closer until he could
see more.
A column of cold flame, white and blue, writhing and
spinning, filled the gap in the lattice. Mostly, it was half
the height of the array, but it occasionally burst upward,
as if in joy, sending an arm of flame lancing toward the
heights.
'I can see someone down there,' George said.
Aubrey started and nearly lost his grip. He hadn't heard
George approaching.
'How many?'
'Just one, I think.'
Caroline made a sound deep in her throat. 'It's Dr
Tremaine.'
She lifted her head and scanned the area. It was
obvious to Aubrey that she was looking for a way down.
She wasn't about to shirk a confrontation with the man
who killed her father.
Aubrey tried to think of a good enough argument to
change her mind, counselling caution over impulse.
He blinked and almost smiled when he realised that
this was just the sort of advice he'd ignored over the
years, from some of the best.
Caroline glanced back the way they'd come and her
face fell. 'Oh.'
Aubrey followed her gaze and immediately saw the
danger. He did his best to appear steely calm, turning a
groan of dismay into what he hoped was a determined
grunt, while his whole being insisted that elsewhere
(anywhere!) was a better place to be.
A swarm of glittering motes was speeding toward
them. Insects was what immediately came to mind – bees
or wasps – and Aubrey became aware of a humming
that was quite different from the background noise from
the structure. It was an angry sound, full of intent. The
swarm bent in their direction and the humming became
furious as it dived.
Aubrey started scrambling on all fours, grasping
whatever came to hand. Finding action a good antidote
to terror, he set off in a different direction to
Caroline, trying to draw the swarm away. He hoped
George would do the same and perhaps one of them
could escape.
He'd only managed a few frenzied yards when one of
the insects struck him behind the ear with stunning
force. He fell forward, barely catching himself, then he
was struck again, just under the shoulder blades, and he
grunted with pain.
It felt as if he were being pelted with stones.
A pistol sounded, once, twice, three times in quick
succession. He hoped it was Caroline and he hoped she'd
done some good.
One of the insects struck the pipe he was clutching
and it rang like a bell. He stared and saw that it was,
indeed, a winged insect – but it was made of bright,
coppery metal. The insect was chillingly unformed. No
features, no details apart from the segmented body, legs
and wings. It staggered a little, as if dazed, then it dropped
off the pipe and vanished into the depths of the structure.
Dragging a fine copper wire behind it.
Horrified, Aubrey jerked his head back as another
insect hummed past his eyes. It curved around and he
was dismayed to see that it, too, was trailing a fine
copper wire.
Another crashed into a steel cable near Aubrey's hand.
He stared at it, but couldn't make out where the insect
ended and the wire began. The insect was an extension
of the wire or the wire was an extension of the insect.
And it doesn't matter!
he thought frantically. He tried
to assemble the beginnings of a spell – any spell – but
the copper insects had found him. They bombarded
him, scores of them, stinging his back and legs with
bruising force.
The gap in the structure beckoned. Perhaps if he
reached it . . .
The hail of insects kept on, wave after angry wave,
battering at him with brutal, senseless ferocity. Aubrey
put his head down and crawled.
Then a wire snaked around his ankle.
He pulled loose, but another snagged at his wrist.
Desperately, he jerked his head around to find that
the insects were crawling over his legs, scuttling along
pipes, looping their trailing wires around his body and
limbs.
Aubrey thrashed, trying to free himself from the insistence
of the wire, not caring if his struggles took him to
the edge of the lattice. Revulsion seized him as he realised
that this is what must have happened to Maggie and his
skin shrank from the evil attention of the creatures.
This gave him renewed energy. He threw himself from
side to side, ignoring the bright pain that came when he
struck elbows and knees on pipes and chains. He cracked
his head with enough force to make his teeth snap
together. Stars jumped in front of his eyes, but he
couldn't throw off loop after loop of copper wire that
kept coming. He tucked in his chin, fearing he'd be
strangled.
While he struggled he heard a steady stream of oaths
and shouts from George, who seemed to be trying to
keep the insects off by power of voice. Aubrey was
appalled to hear his friend's shouts growing angrier and
angrier, until they became wordless, strangled growling.
At the same time, he heard more pistol shots from
nearby. When he rolled to avoid a squad of manic insects
descending on his throat, he saw Caroline springing
across the framework like a gymnast. One-handed, she
swung on an upright and blasted three quick shots that
seemed to have some effect on the swarm of insects
gathering around her. Even in his difficulties, Aubrey had
time to be astonished at her marksmanship, but he
groaned to see the pistol plucked from her hand and a
blanket of copper wire swirling around her.
Then he had troubles enough of his own. The insects
descended like the Furies. He tried to raise a hand to
protect his face but found that his left arm was pinned by
his side. His right arm had been trapped diagonally across
his body. His legs were wrapped together. Unable to
move an inch, he snapped his jaws, trying to bite at the
insects as they scuttled across his face.
Finally, he was immobilised. He couldn't even attempt
a spell – the wires criss-crossed his face, making clear
speech impossible.
With the sort of calm deliberation that comes after
horror has become too much, he wondered when they
would start to penetrate his skin.
A painful clanking sound echoed through the pipes
Aubrey was lying on, as if a giant gear had just slipped
a cog. It rattled his teeth. Then it was a series of chuffing,
pounding thumps, one after the other, like giant
footsteps.
Steam washed over Aubrey and he gagged at the hot,
oily smell.
A voice cut through the cloud. 'Ah, Fitzwilliam and
friends. Just in time.'
Aubrey threw off the heavy hand of dread and decided
that bravado was all he had left. He strained until he had
some slack in the wires over his jaw. 'Give up, Tremaine,'
he slurred. 'It's all over.'
Dr Tremaine loomed into view, stepping off a platform
that hadn't been there a moment ago. He was dressed in
a green jacket that was so dark it was almost black and he
carried a familiar cane. He crouched and studied Aubrey's
copper-wrapped face.
'Fitzwilliam, you overrate your comedic talents.'
Tremaine plucked at one of the copper wires. It snapped
against Aubrey's cheek, but he'd steeled himself. He
didn't want to give Tremaine the pleasure of seeing him
flinch. 'Now, let's descend to the anastomosis.'
Aubrey couldn't help himself. 'Anastomosis?' he asked
mushily.
For once, Dr Tremaine showed irritation. 'Juncture.
Nexus. Chiasma. Confluence.' He snorted. 'Never mind.
You'll see. It might be the last thing you'll see, but you'll
see.'
He clicked his fingers. A copper insect appeared. It
hurried backward and forward, tightening copper wire
over Aubrey's face until he was well and truly speechless.
A
T THE BOTTOM OF THE GAP IN THE MIDDLE OF THE
invigorated framework was a circular walkway.
It ran around the edge of a pit, some twenty feet or so
across.
It was the pit that held Aubrey's appalled attention.
From it grew the leaping, mounting pillar of magical fire
– cold fire, raw magic on the verge of being shaped into
something terrible. This was the focus, the origin of the
waves of magic that were rolling through the latticework.
Erratically, it sloughed off magical power that
Aubrey felt as if it were handfuls of hail.
From his vantage point, Aubrey could see the pipes,
wires, chains and beams funnelling into the flame. They
weren't consumed; they were channelling the awesome
power of the flame outward, radiating through the
latticework. They tightened, clanking or trembling as
the magic pulsed.
And then
? Aubrey thought and dread seized his innards
in an icy grip.
Stalking along the walkway, attention on the magical
flame, ignoring his captives, was Dr Tremaine.
Aubrey, Caroline and George were each enmeshed in
copper webs, pinned against upright pipes. Aubrey could
move his head only fractions of an inch, but it was
enough to see his friends. In the flickering light, he
could make out the strain in their faces as they struggled
with their bonds. To make his situation worse, the conduits
running behind Aubrey's shoulderblades throbbed
and pulsed with malignant regularity, jarring his teeth
and shaking his vision.
Aubrey had been in better positions. In fact, he
decided that every other part of his life was rather better
than where he found himself right now.
Dr Tremaine's angry pacing took him along the
walkway directly in front of Aubrey and his friends, only
a few yards away. He looked deep in thought, but
reserved, as if this was an ordinary magical laboratory
and he a comfortable don. He occasionally paused and
contemplated the magnificence of the pillar of cold
flame, rubbing his chin and frowning before uttering
sharp, coarse spells. After each, the pillar of flame would
change – growing, twisting, writhing in an agony of
growth – and Aubrey would feel magic sleeting from
it in indiscriminate bursts of power. The latticework
around them groaned and shook like the rigging of a
ship in a storm.
He managed to make a noise – a hurtful grunt – and
Dr Tremaine glanced at him. 'Don't worry. Your time will
come very, very soon.'
With implacable efficiency, the ex-Sorcerer Royal went
about his business.
And his business chilled Aubrey to the core. With
a proficiency that would have impressed Professor
Mansfield, Dr Tremaine roamed across dozens of ancient
languages, some of which Aubrey knew, some he had
knowledge of, and others that were totally alien to him,
to create a dense, interwoven series of spells.
Each individual spell was fiendish in its length and
complexity, but Tremaine seemed to be unaffected by
the Principle of Cost – he didn't flag at all.
In addition, he regularly broke a cardinal rule of spell
construction – he used a number of different languages
within the same spell.
Under other circumstances, Aubrey would have been
fascinated to watch a master at work. This eclectic, individual
approach was a virtuoso display. He would have
questioned, taken notes, and felt privileged to observe
such craft.
Instead, he was trapped with a rapidly increasing
feeling of alarm as each of Dr Tremaine's refinements
made the pillar of flame grow, clawing upward with
greedy fingers that boiled with power.
Dr Tremaine was attempting some sort of animating
magic. It was like that which they'd encountered in the
Roman shrine, but only in the same way that a kitten
resembles a tiger. This was immeasurably more powerful,
more complex, more wide-ranging. Apparently he'd had
some success already, judging from the copper wire
insects and Maggie's appalling condition.
The tower of cold fire was at the heart of Dr
Tremaine's conjuring. He stoked it with spells and it
grew with baleful splendour. Its power – the power of
animation – was channelled outward through the pipes,
wires and cables that speared into it.
And where does it go then?
Aubrey thought, but he was
already beginning to form conclusions – and none of
them were joyous.
With a cry of exasperation, the sorcerer cut short
his current spell. He whirled. 'You fool! Don't you
know you're endangering the whole project by interrupting
me!'
Aubrey started, even though he couldn't imagine
how he'd interrupted. Flicking his gaze to either side,
he could make out that Caroline and George were
both still bound – but then he saw that someone was
joining them.
A figure squirmed through a small gap between a
twisted bundle of rusty chains and a red-painted steam
pipe, head and shoulders emerging with much grunting.
He was grimy and dishevelled, smeared with grease. His
clothes, once fine and expensive, were a mess, and Aubrey
saw with bleak satisfaction that he was wearing a red tie
with a green suit and the combination clashed horribly.
The intruder's mouth fell open at the sight of the
trapped Aubrey, Caroline and George. 'What are they
doing here?'
'What does it look like, Rokeby-Taylor? Quantity
surveying? Landscape painting?'
'You're not going to embed them?'
'Of course I'm going to embed them. Human
consciousness is vital to animating my magnificent
creation.' Dr Tremaine heaved a huge, theatrical sigh,
then cocked an eyebrow at his captives. 'I really must
get a better quality of henchman. But there's not a lot
to choose from, these days, when it comes to toadies
and traitors.'
Rokeby-Taylor heaved himself out of the latticework,
but fell heavily. Picking himself up with awkward solemnity,
he tried to straighten his clothes and brush off the
mess but only made it worse. He shook his head and
wiped his hands on his jacket. 'The tunneller has broken
down again,' he said to Dr Tremaine, 'but I've finished the
last connector.'
'And placed the vivifying wires?'
'I think so. If the infernal machine worked properly.'
'It's good to see you've done something right,'
Dr Tremaine said absently. He flexed his shoulders and
considered the cold flame. 'Especially seeing as the last
thing you managed without cocking it up was concealing
that thunderstorm spell at Count Brandt's little
meeting.'
It was Caroline who succeeded in squeezing out
a wordless cry of outrage. Aubrey simply felt despair.
He'd been right in his first suspicions – Rokeby-Taylor
had played a part in that atrocity. Why hadn't he
listened to himself?
'I'll have you know,' Rokeby-Taylor said to Aubrey,
Caroline and George, trying to regain some dignity, 'that
I don't approve of this embedding.'
In his confining mesh, Aubrey sagged until the wire
threatened to cut into his skin. He'd had his suspicions,
but deep down he'd tried to convince himself it wasn't
so. To see Rokeby-Taylor, the epitome of the Albion
gentleman, in league with the foremost enemy of the
land was a blow.
Dr Tremaine sneered at Rokeby-Taylor. 'You don't
approve? I'll show them what you approved of without
an instant's hesitation.'
He spat out a short spell. A section of the structure
began to extrude itself from the meshwork, pushing out
into the central vantage point. Pipes, wires, rails thrust
forward, clanking and shunting, telescoping, growing
while steam hissed around it. Sparks ran along its length,
crackling with glee.
It was a cube, three or four yards on a side, connected
by an arm that was composed of beams and pipes intertwined
with the bright copper wire Aubrey had come
to loathe.
It chuffed and ground its way toward the beckoning
Dr Tremaine.
At that moment, in this nightmare world of intersections
and junctions, Aubrey himself made a connection.
He saw the city as a map, but a map of many levels,
extending deep beneath the surface. Dr Tremaine had
learned to animate the network that connected the
underworld. Pipes, wires, rails, cables, canals all crisscrossing,
interlinking and interweaving throughout the
substrata of the city and Dr Tremaine was uniting them
under his will. The animating power of the cold fire was
permeating all Trinovant.
He began to tremble as his imagination supplied
details. Dr Tremaine's reach wouldn't be confined to the
realms beneath the city. Wires, pipes and drains penetrated
every building in the modern city, joining them
in an elaborate grid, a web with a malevolent genius at
its centre.
Aubrey's heart raced – pointlessly, for he was unable to
either fight or flee. He was worried that it would take
matters into its own hands, burst from his chest and try
to escape.
The cube continued to ratchet forward. The clanking
made Aubrey wince; it sounded poorly constructed,
metal grating on metal, but it continued its jerky
movement with no sign of weakness. Finally, with the
sound of clashing gears, it dropped to eye height.
'See?' Dr Tremaine poked at the cube with his cane.
'Mr Rokeby-Taylor was quite happy for poor urchins to
be embedded. His righteousness didn't extend that far.'
He stroked his chin. 'It's a pity the girl got away. I have
no idea how she managed to tear herself free.'
Sickened, Aubrey gazed into the heart of the cube.
Maggie's Crew. A dozen small bodies were implanted
in a dense mesh of copper wire. It was as if they were
sprouting bizarre copper hair from all over, making it
hard to see where the wire ended and their body began.
Even in the extremity of his own situation, Aubrey
mourned for them. They didn't deserve what had
happened to them. Life's victims, for a brief moment –
with Maggie's help – it had looked as if they had hope,
but they had ended up as dead as the other lost children
on the streets of Albion.
A moan came from his left and he saw that Caroline
had closed her eyes, trying to keep the horror away.
George, on the other hand, was straining against the
copper wire, a snarl coming from his tortured throat.
Then the nearest embedded urchin opened his eyes.
Aubrey would have screamed if he had been able.
'Oh yes,' Dr Tremaine said, chuckling at Aubrey's
distress. 'They're still alive. Alive and vital. It's the vitality
that is useful, after all, feeding into the process. Human
consciousness and great magic go hand in hand. Magic,
the universe, humanity, all intertwined, all available for
manipulation.' He pointed with his cane. 'And we have
all sorts of other life wired as part of this beautiful
creation too, to add to the piquancy of the creation. I was
particularly interested in life that we found down here.
Indigenous to the area, you might say.'
'Put them away, Tremaine,' Rokeby-Taylor said. His
face was drawn and haggard; his eyes darted uncertainly.
He swallowed before continuing. 'Just put them away,
there's a good fellow.'
Dr Tremaine gave Rokeby-Taylor a look that very
clearly said that he wasn't anyone's good fellow, but
he growled out another spell. With a chuff of steam, the
cube and its supports shunted away until it was an undistinguishable
part of the structure again.
'We have life aplenty embedded in the array,'
Dr Tremaine went on, as if Rokeby-Taylor hadn't
interrupted. 'Rats – thousands of them – pigeons, bats, a
surprising number of foxes, a few badgers. And humans.
Nothing like a bit of human to add vigour to a spell,
I always say.'
The ex-Sorcerer Royal crossed his arms. He contemplated
the majesty of the cold fire. Its light flickered on
his profile.
'But not them, Tremaine,' Rokeby-Taylor said. 'Not
the Prime Minister's son. Not the girl.'
Aubrey immediately felt offended – and concerned –
on George's behalf. And it felt grubby, having his life
pleaded for by Rokeby-Taylor. He wanted to go and
have a good wash.
The cold light lingered on Tremaine's face. 'Are you
still sure you want to do this, Rokeby-Taylor? Do you
really want to destroy the greatest city in the world?'
Rokeby-Taylor fumbled with his tie. 'It was your idea.'
'Naturally it was my idea. No-one else in the world
would have been capable of conceiving such a thing.
Animating Trinovant? Only Mordecai Tremaine would
dare. Urbomancy is not something that small minds can
contemplate.'
Urbomancy. Of course. Aubrey closed his eyes. Dr
Tremaine was not a man for small plans. Trinovant in this
era was different from the urban civilisations of the past.
Not even the Romans, fine engineers though they were,
had the extensive underground skeleton that electricity,
gas, water, sewerage and transportation provided. Tremaine
was using it to animate all Trinovant.
The horror came to him with swift, punishing clarity.
Railway tracks rising like giant serpents, intertwining
and crushing buildings. Electrical wires lashing panicked
pedestrians. Pipes wrenching themselves from the
ground and flattening entire neighbourhoods, before
jetting gas, steam and water to wreak havoc. The earth
itself rising, held together by the web of power, shedding
itself of shops, homes and palaces the same way a dog
shakes off fleas.
He felt sick.
'It's beyond me,' Rokeby-Taylor said, but then he
looked sharply at Dr Tremaine. 'Not that I have a small
mind, Tremaine.'
'Of course not.' Dr Tremaine pressed both hands
together. He strolled over and brought his face close to
Aubrey's. 'Now, my interfering friend. Soon you will
belong to the city in a way of which you couldn't even
dream.'
Aubrey decided that Dr Tremaine had a very low
opinion of his dreaming abilities.
He was experiencing a peculiar mixture of emotions.
He was scared, but that seemed natural enough in the
circumstances. However, it wasn't the crippling fear of
panic; it was the heart-thumping fear of consequences,
the hollow pit of the stomach that came from thinking
what could happen if they couldn't get out of this.