Mark Chadbourn - The Hounds of Avalon

‘No idea,’ Hal said. ‘Some kind of talisman? Where did you find it?’

‘A site in Cornwall. We’ve puzzled over it for a while. But that’s a conversation for another day. This is what I wanted to show you.’ Reid put the star back in its case and picked up the Wish Stone. ‘Another artefact this Brother of Dragons was carrying when we found him. He’s refused to answer any of our questions about where he got it, or what it’s for, which suggests it has some importance, but we believe he recovered it from Cadbury Hill. It may even have been his reason for being there. Here — hold it.’

The moment the Wish Stone came into contact with Hal’s skin, crackling blue light surged out to trace a picture in the air of two men next to a tomb, overlooked by a woman. Hal dropped the stone and Reid caught it with a deft movement. ‘Careful!’

‘Sorry. It shocked me. How does it work? What was that scene?’ Hal felt as if he had seen it somewhere before.

‘We have no idea what it represents or what it means, whether it’s something we should be studying or just a distraction.’

‘Why are you showing it to me?’

‘We need you to find out what it is. Do some research — you’re good at that, I’m told.’ Reid’s attention was already wandering; he clearly didn’t care whether Hal found out what the stone was for or not.

‘Do you want me to report directly back to you?’

‘Yes, of course.’ Reid walked away, stripping the gloves from his hands with a loud snap. He turned, raising his finger for emphasis. ‘Don’t say anything about this to anyone else. Do you understand?’

Hal nodded, confused by the mixed signals he was receiving. But the image from the stone was already tugging at his subconscious. He felt instinctively that this was important.

The air had the summer twilight smell of a hot day cooling, of rolling grassland and wild flowers and the tangy musk of distant forests. Sophie stood on the high balcony with Caitlin at her side, looking towards the west. The reddening sun, bisected by the dark horizon, lay against a sky of shimmering gold and flaming orange. Far below them, the Court of Soul’s Ease was quietening as the residents hurried to their homes after a day of business in the bustling, otherworldly city. Yet the evening was not entirely peaceful, for a drone of activity came from beyond the sturdy walls.

Sophie wrinkled her nose. ‘Can you smell that?’ In one hand she gripped a spear she had drawn from the armoury, the tip gleaming silver, the shaft hard wood branded with mystical symbols; it never missed, she was told.

‘Smoke. The fires are starting.’ Caitlin’s weapon of choice was a longbow and arrows.

The moment the words had left her mouth, bursts of red and yellow flared up in the pooling shadows beyond the walls, illuminating what at first sight looked like a mass of swarming ants surrounding the entire city. As the firelight flickered and the shadows washed back and forth across the teeming multitude, it became clear that it was an army of the little men who had attacked Sophie and Ceridwen on their journey to the court.

‘I came here for safety while I looked for an opportunity to get back home,’ Sophie said bitterly. ‘Now I’m stuck here under siege. Mallory probably thinks I’m dead. Goddess knows what else is happening in our world.’

‘I think being in the wrong place at the wrong time goes with the territory,’ Caitlin said quietly.

Sophie cast a secretive glance at her. In the four days since she had arrived in the Court of Soul’s Ease, she had got to know Caitlin very well. A deep sadness filled her, but most of the time she managed to mask it behind smiles. Sophie could easily imagine Caitlin as a GP back in the real world. She cared deeply about everyone, enough to swallow what must have been a toxic amount of grief to ensure that she didn’t make anyone else suffer along with her. That thoughtfulness alone would have been enough to win over Sophie, but Caitlin also had an admirably quiet strength and resilience. Sophie thought that the two of them would probably become friends, given time.

Yet one great barrier lay between them. Sophie was a Sister of Dragons, and Caitlin was not, not any more. It tormented Caitlin in many ways, layering more misery on top of her mourning: she feared that the whole of humanity would pay the price for what she saw as her weakness of character. And the loss of that inestimable quality that set them apart as Sisters of Dragons was as devastating as if she had lost the use of her legs. Probably more so, for Caitlin had confided in her the previous night that it was as if she had been given a glimpse of heaven, only to have it snatched away for evermore. It wasn’t just the strength and healing ability that she missed, but the sense of being connected to the entire universe; she was bereft in more ways than one.

‘Don’t jump — we need you.’

The brash Birmingham accent had become familiar to Sophie over the past four days. Harvey stood in the middle of Caitlin’s quarters, a working-class youth as out of his depth as anyone could possibly get, yet who still acted as if he was heading down to his local. Sophie liked him immensely. Beside him was his friend, Thackeray, a deep thinker who liked to pretend he was a doomed romantic. They had both found themselves accidentally caught up in the events that had brought Caitlin to T’ir n’a n’Og, but for their part had stuck by Caitlin resolutely, giving her the strength to keep going. Thackeray was easy to read; every aspect of him suggested that he was deeply in love with Caitlin, and Sophie had the feeling that Caitlin returned the affection on some level, though it was never discussed.

Harvey shifted uncomfortably when Sophie and Caitlin came in from the balcony. ‘You two freak me out,’ he said bluntly. ‘It was bad enough when she was going all Wonder Woman on us.’ He nodded to Caitlin. ‘Now there’s you as well. Where’s it going to end?’

‘He loves it really,’ Thackeray said. ‘He’s got this fantasy about amazons-’

‘Oi!’ Harvey punched Thackeray hard on the shoulder. ‘That was the beer talking. Anyway, you shouldn’t be repeating what I tell you in confidence.’

‘We found a pub. The Sun. Big surprise in a city ruled by a sun god,’ Thackeray said.

‘They give us free beer,’ Harvey said excitedly. ‘ All given freely and without obligation.’

‘The way we figured it,’ Mallory said, ‘we could either hang around here, getting under your feet and offering less than useful opinions on how the siege could be broken-’

‘Or we could get pissed,’ Harvey finished.

‘Not really a contest, was it?’ Caitlin said. ‘As long as you’re enjoying yourselves.’

‘Before you go castigating us, we’ve got a message,’ Thackeray said. ‘There’s a big war conference wrapping up down in the main hall. And they want to see you two.’

‘Finally,’ Sophie said. ‘They’re going to break the siege so that we can get out of here and back home.’

Thackeray shook his head. ‘I think they’re just going to sit back and wait.’

‘Maybe whatever it is that makes us Sisters of Dragons attracts bad things like this,’ Sophie said to Caitlin as they marched into the great hall.

Lugh was waiting for them, his solar armour burnished red in the light of the setting sun that streamed through the floor-to-ceiling windows. Behind him, Ceridwen waited with a serious expression.

‘It is the Pendragon Spirit that shapes your days and nights, guides you to be where you should, where you are needed. It is the power that binds everything together,’ Lugh said.

‘What did your war conference decide?’ Caitlin asked impatiently.

‘The hidden passage out of the Court of Soul’s Ease is still blocked by… the enemy.’ Lugh still had difficulty considering his own people a threat. ‘The only way out is through the gates.’