Simon Green - Spirits from Beyond

“Or to keep Something out,” said Kim.

JC looked at her thoughtfully. “What is this place a home for, now?”

“The dead, mostly,” said Kim. “Those not departed enough.”

“Depends on whom you talk to,” Melody said sternly. “There are sites on the Net. .”

“And you’ve argued with most of them,” said Happy.

“I don’t necessarily believe everything I hear,” said Melody, ignoring Happy. “But there are some fascinating stories out there, concerning what lives or perhaps more properly speaking exists, down here in the Undertowen.”

“I know I’m going to regret saying this,” said JC. “But such as. .?”

“Some say. . the results of scientific experiments, run wild, having broken out of very secret laboratories,” said Melody. “Or, the abandoned offspring of Snake Deities and Alien Greys. Refugees from the Nightside, hiding out until the pursuit goes cold. The last surviving remnants of ancient races and species long thought extinct in the world above. The lost and the strayed, the forgotten and the damned.”

“Happy’s right,” said JC. “You will believe absolutely anything.”

Melody brandished her machine-pistol angrily. “At least I’m prepared!”

“You really think a gun is going to help you down here, in the place of the dead?” said Kim, not unkindly.

“Couldn’t hurt,” said Melody.

JC looked at Kim. “What, exactly, are we going to be facing?”

“The ghost of a dead god and what remains of his court,” said Kim. “But don’t press me for details. The Flesh Undying has been meddling here. There are rumours, in certain places, that these days the corridors are full of his creatures. The weaponised dead. .”

Happy leaned in close beside JC. “Remind me again why we wanted her back?”

* * *

The Ghost Finders walked on through the stone galleries, which slowly and subtly changed their shape and nature until the group realised they were walking through a dead grey forest, made up of twisted and distorted trees, looming above them, made of stone. Branches protruded stiffly, with no leaves anywhere. Mottled tree-trunks thrust directly up out of the grey stone floor, with no sign of roots. The stone trees were packed close together, with only a narrow, twisting trail to lead the Ghost Finders on. Happy leaned in close for a good look at one of the grey trees; and then never did that again.

“Fossilised trees?” said Melody, after a while. “How is that even possible? I mean, how old would trees have to be, before. .”

“Maybe there’s a Gorgon down here,” Happy said brightly.

“The trees continue because the Druids continue,” Kim said quietly. “Because this is the world they remember. From when they were alive. There are old sleeping powers here, and people. The Flesh Undying has promised to aid them if they will serve him. They know we’re here. They know we’re coming.”

“All right,” said JC. “How do we fight them?”

“We can’t,” said Kim. “But the ghost of the old god Lud, he can. If we can persuade him that such actions are in his best interests.”

“Marvellous,” said Melody. “What can we promise him that The Flesh Undying can’t? What does a dead god want, anyway?”

“Broad band?” said Happy.

“Come on,” said JC, “We can do this! Slapping down ghosts is our business.”

“You can be so cocky sometimes,” said Melody.

“I know!” said JC. “It’s one of my most endearing qualities.”

* * *

Kim insisted on taking the lead as they pressed on between towering stone trees, following a trail or direction only she could see. The moonlight that fell from no moon took on a blue-white, shimmering aspect, while the surrounding shadows seemed to grow deeper and darker all the time. The air smelled close and bad, as though something had breathed all the goodness out of it long ago. JC strode along beside Kim, quietly trying to get her to open up and answer some questions; but she had nothing further to say. Melody clung firmly on to her machine-pistol with one hand and hauled Happy along with the other. He kept wanting to go off and chase butterflies. But in the end, he was the first one to realise they were not alone in the stone forest. That something, or rather some large number of somethings, was following along with them. Sticking to the more extreme shadows, staying well out of sight; a presence more felt than properly observed.

JC pulled everyone in close and kept them moving. He trusted Kim’s sense of direction, but he still had to wonder if they were being herded. . Whatever was moving silently along with them between the grey trees felt bad. A threat to the spirit as well as the body. Something that served the kind of forces that could only be found in the dark. JC could hear them, after a while, moving in closer, behind and around them. Surrounding them, forever on the edge of vision, barely glimpsed out of the corner of the eye. Melody waved her machine-pistol around until JC made her lower it again. He didn’t want to start something he wasn’t sure he could win. Until finally the trees fell suddenly back to either side, revealing a huge open space before them-a vast natural amphitheatre. A carefully arranged setting for what was waiting for them.

The Ghost Finders came to a halt. JC looked up, half-expecting to see an open night sky above, complete with full moon. But there was only stone and gloom above. So JC had no choice but to look at the terrible thing sitting on its throne, before them.

Lud was huge. A massive, towering, mostly human figure, sitting unmoving on a throne so old. . that both Lud and his throne seemed impossibly ancient. And equally fossilised. Like the trees in his forest. JC had never seen anything, living or dead, as big as Lud. In his time, in his prime, Lud could have intimidated dinosaurs. His shape and proportions were subtly wrong, even disturbing to any normal human sense of aesthetics; but in the end the thing on the throne looked more like a man than anything else. Its skin was grey and dusty, like the trees. It almost looked like a statue, a nightmare carved in old stone; but it was clearly, unsettlingly, so much more than that. It had a huge, horned, almost skeletal head, with an elongated muzzle packed full of blocky teeth, and two deep, dark, empty eye-sockets. The horns looked more like branches than bone, and even more like branching antlers.

JC hated to think how big Lud would be if he ever rose from his throne again.

“He’s been dead for centuries,” Kim said softly. “And he hasn’t moved from that throne since the Romans left Britain.”

“But, he’s still. . here,” said Happy. “A physical presence; not just a spirit. Like you.”

“That is the ghost of a god,” said Kim. “The rules are different.”

“Rules?” said Melody. “There are rules? Who sets them?”

“Such things are decided where all the things that matter are decided,” said Kim. “On the shimmering plains, in the Courts of the Holy.”

“If anything, I think I feel even less confident than before you started explaining things,” said Happy.

“We’re currently standing under that part of London known as Ludgate,” said Kim. “Where St. Paul’s Cathedral is now. A Christian holy site, put in place over an old pagan site. They did that a lot, to hold the old things down. Lud’s Gate, where the first Wicker Men were ignited; whose awful burning light illuminated Druid Britain from coast to coast. And here before us, on his throne, all that remains of the old god Lud. People have attributed all kinds of stories and powers to him; sun god, warrior god, protector of his people during the long winter. . but Lud was here long before there were humans around to worship him. He chose to become a humanlike form, so humans could more easily worship him. He wanted to scare them, not scare them off. Lud isn’t even his real name. I don’t think anyone knows what Lud was, originally. Faith is fuel, to his kind. They feed on emotions, and death, and souls. You don’t think The Flesh Undying had the shape it does now, the one we saw in the vision, before it was kicked out of the greater world it came from? No; it was forced into its present shape, contained by the physical limitations of this world, to punish it. Its shape and conditions are the true bars of its cage.”