Simon Green - A Hard Day's Knight

“Good!” said Arthur. “Now, for the sake of all that’s good and holy, let us leave this dismal and unpleasant place!”

“Best idea I’ve heard yet,” said Alex. “Come on up to the bar. Drinks are on me.”

“Ah!” said Arthur, beaming. “Best idea I’ve heard so far.”

Alex led the way back to the stone steps. I moved in beside him.

“Can’t help noticing you were a bit quiet back there.”

“What is there to say?” said Alex. “That’s King bloody Arthur!”

He had a point. But I’ve never believed in being over-impressed. Especially not by the good guys.

Up in the bar itself, Arthur took a good look round, and wasn’t immediately impressed. The few remaining customers took one look at him and decided to leave right then before the trouble started. Alex moved quickly behind the bar and set about dispensing drinks. Back in his usual position of authority, he was immediately much more at ease, and a lot of his usual caustic manner returned. He even told Kae off for leaning on the wooden bar top in his armour and leaving scratches. Arthur eyed the bar-stools dubiously, and decided to stand. I couldn’t help noticing that Suzie was being even quieter than usual and keeping a watchful eye on Arthur.

Before anyone could think to warn him, Arthur reached out to pet Alex’s vulture, Agatha, still squatting balefully on top of the till. He rubbed her head and chucked her under the chin, talking cheerful nonsense to her, and to everyone’s surprise the bird sat there and let him do it. She actually looked bashfully at Arthur, and fluttered her eyelashes at him. Anyone else, she’d have had his hand off at the wrist.

“Arthur’s always had a way with the beasts and the birds,” said Kae. “Never would go hunting with me.”

“Barbarian sport,” Arthur said briskly. “Killing for necessity is one thing. You’re not supposed to enjoy it.”

He studied the ranks of drinks available behind the bar and beamed happily. “We never had anything like this in my day, did we, Kae? Mead and uisge, and wines that were always half-way towards vinegar. This looks much more interesting. I want lots of drinks, and I want them now. Start pouring, bartender; I have it in me to try at least one of everything. Nothing like sleeping fifteen hundred years to work up a real thirst.”

We all looked on, suitably impressed, as Arthur knocked back the drinks as fast as Alex could produce them, to no obvious effect. Kae smiled proudly, though I noticed he made no attempt to keep up with Arthur. I sipped at a wormwood brandy, to be sociable, while Suzie barely touched her bottle of Gordon’s Gin. She was still watching Arthur carefully. After a while, Arthur belched loudly, stretched as unselfconsciously as any cat, and looked at all the empty glasses racked up before him.

“Don’t suppose there’s anything to eat here, is there?”

“I wouldn’t,” I said quickly.

Alex glared at me. “I’m sure I could find something ...”

“That’s what worries me,” I said. “A somewhat merry King Arthur is one thing; a King full of killer E coli , bent over a toilet when he should be out saving the world, is quite another.”

Alex sulked. “It’s been days since we had a real case of food poisoning.”

“What about that nun who exploded?”

“Coincidence!”

Kae got Arthur really excited over the concept of cocktails, so I moved off down the bar and left them to it. I paused a moment to murmur in Suzie’s ear.

“Why are you keeping such a close eye on King Arthur? He’s saying all the right things.”

“They always do,” said Suzie. “You of all people should know that legends rarely turn out who you expect them to be.”

“But this is King Arthur! If you can’t give someone like him the benefit of the doubt ...”

“I have,” said Suzie. “I haven’t shot him yet.”

“But can’t you ... well, just feel the nobility pouring off the man?”

“I’ve never trusted my feelings,” said Suzie.

I moved even further down the bar, took out my mobile phone, and contacted the Authorities, to find out what had been going on in the Nightside in my absence. I got put straight through to Julien Advent.

“Where the hell have you been, Taylor? All hell’s breaking loose in the Nightside!”

“It always is,” I said.

“Not like this! You’d better come straight to me, so we can talk.”

“Okay. Where are you?”

“You’ve got Walker’s old watch. He programmed it to bring him right to me, in times of need. Open it and say my name, and it’ll lock on and bring you here.”

He hung up on me. I took the gold watch out of my pocket and looked at it thoughtfully. I had to wonder what else Walker might have programmed into it. He always was a great believer in little surprises, and leaving nasty booby-traps for the unsuspecting. I looked back down the bar at the others.

“I have to pop out for a minute. Arthur, don’t touch the bar snacks. Suzie, don’t let Alex put any of this on my bill. I’ll be back soon, then we can set about stopping the elf civil war and saving all Humanity if you’re not too busy.”

“There’s time,” said Arthur expansively. “If there’s one thing sleeping for centuries teaches you, it’s that there’s always time. Now, Sir Alex, more of that peach brandy, I think. Yes. I like the peach brandy. Off you go, John Taylor. Don’t mind us. Lots of drinking still to do. Never face an elf sober; they’ll just take advantage.”

I opened up the gold watch and got the hell out of Strangefellows before I said something someone might regret.

The Portable Timeslip delivered me straight to Julien Advent, dropping me off right on the top of Griffin Hill. I arrived standing on the edge of the great pit where Griffin Hall had once stood, before the Devil himself appeared to drag it down into Hell, along with the Griffin himself and his awful wife. He really should have known better than to make a deal for immortality. No matter how good a contract you have, the Devil is always in the details. I turned my back on the pit, and looked down the long, sloping hillside that led eventually to the Nightside city streets. The strange primordial jungle was still there, still horribly alive and active, thrashing violently as parts of it went to war with the rest. One of these days, the jungle is going to advance down the hill and march on the Nightside, and it will take a lot more than weed-killer to stop it.

I’d put my money on industrial-strength flame-throwers and napalm.

Julien Advent had his back to me, looking out over the Nightside streets, but I had no doubt he knew I was there. The great Victorian Adventurer had been dodging assailants and assassins for longer than I’d been alive. He could spot a ninja in a darkened room two houses away. I moved over to join him.

“Hello, John,” he said, not looking round. “So good of you to join me at such short notice. Hell of a view from up here.”

“Why are we here?” I said. “You know this place has bad memories for me.”

“This is where Walker died, isn’t it?” he said, still not looking at me.

“Yes,” I said. “He tried to kill me. I had no choice.”

“Did he die well?”

I thought about it. “He died in character,” I said finally. “He was himself, right to the very end.”

Julien shrugged. “I suppose that’s the best any of us can hope for. Look out there, John. Look what they’ve done to the Nightside.”

I looked down at the city, that great sprawl of blazing streets and hot neon. The night was full of fires and explosions, strangely coloured flames and magical flare-ups. Buildings were burning like bale-fires in the night, and every now and again an entire block would vanish, to be replaced by something worse. I watched barricaded holdouts detonate, sending burning shrapnel up into the night sky like so many fireworks. There were vivid lights and horrid sounds, and here and there certain landmarks quietly disappeared, running off to hide in some safer dimension.