Marc Chadbourn - The Devil in green

Duncan, the captain of the guards, was a middle-aged bearded man with a thick Birmingham accent. He met them deferentially as they walked to a position near the gates. His attitude reminded Mallory of the respect with which the knights were treated throughout the cathedral, but particularly amongst the guards who knew exactly what they had to endure under Blaine's leadership.

'I could swear it's colder in winter since the Fall. Do you remember the snow last Christmas?' Gardener said as they leaned on the top of the wall, looking out across the city. Their breath clouded, and they had their cloaks pulled around them for warmth.

'That's all we need — a new ice age,' Mallory replied.

'What time does it start?' Gardener asked Duncan.

'They're already out there.' Duncan indicated several points along the street, in doorways and deep shadows, but Mallory could see nothing. 'They're like sentries — there all day and night.'

Mallory couldn't understand how he had got past them; had they let him into the cathedral, and if so, why? Gardener sensed what he was thinking. 'Daniels and me came in too,' he said. 'Don't ask me what's going on. Anybody else that tries to get in or out gets both barrels.'

'The other things come at various points during the dark hours,' Duncan continued. 'They try to break down the walls… cause a bit of damage, but never manage anything too serious.'

'That doesn't make any sense,' Mallory said. 'The things we saw out on Salisbury Plain would be in here in no time.'

'They are kept out by the power of the Lord.' Julian, the bishop's right- hand man had come up behind them. He'd tied his long black hair into a ponytail, but that only served to emphasise the worry and exhaustion in his features. 'Or the power of faith, or whatever you want to call it.'

'Magic?' Mallory suggested mischievously.

Julian didn't appear offended. 'Just words,' he said dismissively. 'Different ways of describing the same thing. Whatever you choose, in this new age the power of prayer and ritual has a dramatic and instant effect. Sacred land becomes empowered. Those things can't set foot within the cathedral compound.'

Mallory thought for a second. 'But why are they trying to get into the cathedral?'

'Why, they're opposed to everything we do,' Julian replied, as if the answer were obvious.

'That seems to be the common view.' Mallory made no attempt to hide his plain disregard for this approach.

Julian appeared momentarily troubled, as if Mallory had given voice to his own doubts, but the precentor brightened when he saw James clambering up the ladder to join them. Mallory had not seen the pleas- ant-natured brother since James' secretive meeting with Julian in the refectory.

'How goes it?' James said cheerily. He was red-cheeked and clapping his arms against his sides theatrically.

'Should bloody sell tickets up here,' Gardener muttered.

'I come up here every night,' James said, 'in the hope that they will finally relent. Their patience must wear thin eventually.'

Mallory disagreed. 'Believe me, they're like a dog with a bone. They're not going to leave until we find some way to break them. I presume we haven't got a way?'

'Your commander has outlined several strategies,' Julian began, before dispensing with the PR. 'Nothing that yet looks like a workable solution. But we'll find it, in time.'

'I love an optimist,' Mallory said.

'I hear you've been consigned to the library?' Julian commented to James.

'Ah, yes. You can never have enough guards for dead trees.' James attempted to mask his sarcasm with a smile, but failed miserably. He caught Julian's arm and said supportively and with honest compassion, 'How is the bishop?'

'Forgive me for speaking disrespectfully, but Cornelius is a determined old bugger. He's not going to shuffle off easily.' Julian's face suggested that the situation was graver than he suggested. 'The vultures are still circling, however.'

James' eyes flickered towards Mallory. Obviously this was not a subject to be discussed in front of others. 'If we stand firm, we will abide,' he said confidently.

'Over there.' Gardener pointed down High Street to where shadows were congealing into small shapes, forming lines, ranks. Mallory squinted, not quite sure what he was seeing.

At first, it could easily have been a trick of the dark and the moonlight, but gradually order appeared out of the chaos of the night. The street was filled from wall to wall with tiny figures, though still too lost to the dark for any details to be visible. They remained there, stock still, for long moments until Mallory was convinced that was the end of the manifestation. But then, with no fanfare, they began to move forwards in uniform step, an army in miniature.

Their procession was slow but deliberate. It took five minutes before they reached the crepuscular zone of the light cast by the torches blazing along the wall. As they emerged from the gloom, James gripped the wall with both hands and whispered, 'Good Lord!'

The figures were no bigger than children of five or six, but were obviously fully formed adults. As the light first hit them they appeared burnished gold, but gradually their skin settled on a ghasdy white. From their spectral faces huge eyes stared, wholly black and too-large, so that they resembled alien insects; they looked like things that had lived below the earth for centuries, only just emerging from the dark. Their outfits were elaborate, part armour, part costumes: breastplates and metal helmets echoing conquistador design, the colour of dull brass; scarlet silk shirts beneath, and red cloaks, epaulettes, clasps, gauntlets, belts; the detail was hallucinogenic. One of them held a standard that reminded Mallory of a Roman legion's. On it was some form of alien writing and an image that appeared to form a circle, although it was difficult to discern detail at that distance.

Women stood amongst the ranks, too, their expressions as venomous as the males', and children, too. They all carried strange weapons — short swords, spears tipped with unpleasant-looking hooks, nasty daggers and brutal axes. Some pulled carts, while a few rode on miniature horses. It could have been a picture from some child's fairy-tale book if not for the menacing atmosphere that hung over the whole scene, made infinitely more eerie by the silence of their progress. Mallory didn't hear so much as a footfall or a rustle of fabric.

Within twenty feet of the walls, they rushed forwards, suddenly ferocious, snapping and snarling like wild dogs. Mallory gripped on to the side as the wall and walkway shook. For an instant he thought it was going to go down.

'The hoards of bloody hell!' Gardener said in a strained voice.

After the silence, the clattering of the weapons was deafening. Sparks flew where the swords and spears smashed against the wall's iron plates, now scarred from myriad attacks. The knights and clerics watched with thundering hearts for ten minutes and then the army mysteriously and quickly retreated as if some silent fanfare had been blown, melting back into the shadows as though they had never been there.

'Why do they keep doing that when they know they can't get in!' The anxiety broke Duncan's voice.

Mallory realised he was clutching the rim of the wall so hard his knuckles ached. It was plain there was no escape for any of them; he looked around and saw it in all their faces, though no one would have dared give voice to it.

'Is it always like this?' he asked.

'Nah. Different things on different nights.' Duncan had managed to contain himself and now appeared embarrassed at his emotional outburst. 'In the early days, we had a bunch of bloody loonies on horseback.' His face blanched at the memory. 'Though you'd never seen horses like these, with a pack of dogs running around their feet. They were mean bastards, I tell you.' He caught himself. 'Excuse my language, sirs, but they were.