Marc Chadbourn - The Devil in green

He watched until the Geordie had finished, then was overcome with a devilish idea. As Gardener trudged away, Mallory rolled a snowball and hurled it with devastating aim, hitting Gardener squarely at the base of his skull. Gardener whirled, eyes blazing, but when he saw Mallory his face went blank. Mallory had a sudden sense of his miscalculation until Gardener dipped down, rolled a snowball and launched it with one lightning move. It struck Mallory in his chest, showering snow across his face.

For a second, everything hung, and then they both exploded with raucous laughter, leaping into a frenzied bout of snowball-throwing. Within moments, they heard a whoop as Miller and Daniels ran up. Gardener and Mallory hit them both before they were halfway across the lawns.

For the next fifteen minutes, they forgot all the pressures of the daily strife in complete childlike abandon. Mallory joked, 'Stay on Daniels' blindside!' while Miller darted back and forth among them, whirling snowballs as if he were crazed. By the end, when they were all covered in white from head to toe, even Gardener was laughing. They collapsed into the snow, exhausted but still in high spirits.

Three members of the Blues walked by, watching their ridiculous fun with disdain. One of them sneered that they were bringing the knights into disrepute, following his comment with a whispered disparaging remark that brought mocking laughter from his colleagues. Mallory gave them the finger, while Miller threw a snowball in their direction. The Blues rounded, spoiling for a fight until the ringleader calmed them and led them on their way.

'Wankers,' Mallory said.

'No sense of humour,' Daniels added. 'Always a bad sign.'

Suddenly something struck Mallory, so obvious that he wondered why he hadn't considered it before. 'Why are they called Blues?' he asked. The blue flash on their shoulders had set them apart from the very first.

No one knew, but after his conversation with James, Mallory had an idea. Their very existence, all the mysterious missions on which they regularly embarked, had something to do with the Blue Fire: they were an elite squad in more ways than one.

His thoughts were interrupted by the acrid smell of smoke drifting across the compound accompanied by the sound of crackling fire. Filled with curiosity, they made their way around the side of the new buildings to its source near the gates, where a large bonfire was sending up thick black clouds.

'What are they wasting all that fuel for?' Daniels asked.

It was only then that they saw the lines of brothers emerging from the cathedral with armfuls of books, some ancient with crumbling spines, many shiny leather-backed volumes, even modern pamphlets.

'The library,' Mallory said. 'He really did it, the Nazi.'

'Ah, they're only books,' Gardener dismissed

Mallory turned on him. 'They're not only books. They're ideas, thoughts, beliefs-'

Gardener interrupted with a shrug. 'That's right, but they're not our ideas, thoughts, beliefs.'

Mallory knew there was no point in arguing. He turned back to the sad sight until he noticed three figures watching the bonfire across the way, almost obscured by the drifting smoke. When it cleared for a moment, he saw it was James, his face drawn, shoulders hunched, standing between two upright, characterless young men who were clearly inquisitors.

The red flames contrasted starkly with the white of the snow. He watched for another moment, then trudged slowly back to the dormitory alone.

An hour later he was called to a fight in the refectory. Two brothers were brawling over the size of their portions at dinner. It was a stupid argument — there couldn't have been more than half a carrot in it — but in that claustrophobic atmosphere tempers frayed easily. One of the men had received a broken nose. The lower half of his face was stained red, and it was Mallory's job to escort him to the infirmary while giving him a caution. Miller was taking the other one for a dressing-down before one of the inquisitors.

As they left the refectory, the broken-nosed man was sullen and depressed; he'd lost his dinner in the scuffle and there would be nothing more until the thin gruel they laughingly called breakfast. Mallory didn't have the heart to deliver the caution Blaine had outlined for such occasions, so they walked in silence.

When they arrived at the infirmary, they were surprised to find the place in disarray. Warwick's surgical utensils were scattered across the floor, the contents of some herb jars had been emptied and the operating table was upended. Warwick sat on a chair in one corner, white-faced and uneasy. He was surrounded by two stony-faced Blues and a tall, weasley inquisitor who was brandishing Warwick's clockwork radio.

'It's not mine, I tell you,' Warwick protested.

'Your assistant said it was.' The inquisitor examined the radio as if it were filth.

'Well, he's wrong.'

'You know the punishment for hoarding banned technology.'

Warwick looked as if he was going to be sick. 'It's not mine!'

'Why was it hidden amongst your things?' The inquisitor plainly wasn't going to let up.

Mallory wanted to say, It's just a little radio! We all loved them only a few months ago, but he knew the object had taken on new meaning in the rapidly developing language of the cathedral. It was a nuclear bomb, an Ouija board, a letter filled with anthrax. He wondered if he was the only sane one in the entire place.

It looked as if the inquisitor was only just beginning, so Mallory abandoned the broken-nosed man there and wandered into the network of back rooms. He was taken with the desire to see Hipgrave, who hadn't been heard from in days.

The main ward was full. With the food declining, more and more people were getting sick and taking longer to recover, while others were being laid low by injuries they would normally have fended off. Every bed was also taken in a makeshift ward in an annexe. Beyond, there were several single rooms with occupants in various states of illness.

The final room was locked, but like the others it had a window of reinforced glass through which Mallory could see Hipgrave lying in bed, arms straight out by his sides, staring unblinkingly at the ceiling.

Mallory hesitated, then rapped gently on the window. Hipgrave's gaze didn't even flicker towards him. He appeared, to Mallory's untutored eyes, catatonic. A rigid man, the strain of all they'd experienced had finally broken him.

For the first time, Mallory felt pity for Hipgrave. Although the captain had been thoroughly disagreeable, he didn't deserve what had happened to him. None of them deserved it.

Back in the surgery, Warwick's radio lay smashed on the floor. Mallory found it hard to deal with the pointlessness of it all; no more information coming from across the country, no more messages of hope. All thrown away, for some stupid idea of religious belief that was as irrational as all the supernatural creatures pounding on the walls. He'd been consumed with thoughts of vengeance against Blaine and the Church authorities for all his suffering, but the pointlessness of everything in the cathedral had worn him down. Now all he wanted was to get away with Sophie. Stefan and the others could stew in the hell of their own making.

Warwick was nowhere to be seen. Mallory didn't try to divine what that meant, nor what it insinuated for all the sick brothers in the infirmary. There was no sense anywhere.

Leaving the infirmary, he had half a mind to go back to the dorm and climb into bed until he heard raised voices coming from the refectory.

He had expected to find another fight, but the atmosphere was much different. Most of the brothers were standing watching a scene being played out near the serving tables. More inquisitors and Blues were struggling to contain a slight figure throwing himself around in a wildcat frenzy. It was Lewis, Daniels' young boyfriend. When he found a gulp of breath, he let out another burst of shouting so filled with passion that Mallory at first had trouble understanding what he was saying.