Simon Green - Daemons Are Forever

“Oh sure; the more the merrier, I say.”

“Good. Then spread the good news, and tell everyone they need to come to the Sanctity right now.” I grinned. “That should block the corridors nicely, and keep the Circle from interfering with what I’ve got planned.”

“Oh dear,” said Strange. “Are you about to do something desperate and dangerous again?”

“Of course. Mind the store while I’m gone, Strange.”

“Please, call me Ethel.”

“Over my dead and lifeless body.”

To my surprise, when I finally got to the rear of the Hall, avoiding the main corridors that were already filling up with cheering family members, Molly was already there waiting for me. She greeted me with a fond embrace and a smug smile.

“How did you know I was going to be here?” I said.

“Honestly, sweetie, I am a witch, remember? Sorry it took me so long to get away, but Penny took a lot of talking to. I think I finally managed to beat some sense into her pretty little head. There’s no one more stubborn than a secret romantic. Especially one who’s taken it on herself to redeem the unredeemable.”

“Has she agreed to stop seeing Mr. Stab?” I said.

“Well, not as such,” said Molly. “The best I could get out of her was an agreement never to meet with him alone.”

I nodded reluctantly. “Penny always was stubborn. Runs in the family. Baffles me what she sees in him anyway.”

“I suppose it’s like those sad, desperate women who want to marry serial killers in prison,” said Molly. “Women always believe they can change a man, bring out the good in him through the power of their love. Some just like more of a challenge, I suppose. And Mr. Stab does have that dark, dangerous, vulnerable thing going for him. I know, I know, don’t look at me like that; I do know he’s been slaughtering and butchering women for over a century… but there is more to him than that, Eddie. I have seen him do … good things. So have you.”

“He’s Mr. Stab,” I said. “He kills women. That’s what he does. If he hurts Penny…”

“He won’t,” said Molly. “He’s never hurt a friend of mine.”

“If he kills her, I’ll kill him. Friend of yours or not.”

“If it comes to that, I’ll help you,” said Molly. “So, why are we here, Eddie?”

I gestured at the long steel-and-glass hangar, standing tall and proud at the rear of the Hall, though set a discreet distance away. It was a wide, steel-girdered construction, with an arching glass roof, big enough to hold several football matches in simultaneously. The family never does things by halves, even when it comes to museums hardly anyone visits anymore. I took Molly’s arm in mine and led her towards the open entrance.

“I’ve located a very useful ally in the future,” I said. “Unfortunately, he’s so far ahead of us that we’re going to have to go and get him in person. And for that, we need the Time Train.”

“Just the two of us?” said Molly.

“Well,” I said, “I did ask for volunteers, but the response was disappointing. Apparently everyone else had more sense. Time travel is always dangerous, and no one’s actually used the Time Train in ages. Probably with good reason. It’s not the most… reliable device the family ever built. If you’d prefer to stay behind, I’d quite understand. I’d stay behind if I could find anyone daft enough to go in my place.”

Molly hugged my arm firmly to her side. “Do you really think I’d let you go anywhere without me?”

I grinned at her. “I really like this being an item thing.”

“You romantic devil, you. Flatter me with your silver tongue, why don’t you?”

“Together, forever,” I said. “How about that?”

“Forever and ever and ever,” said Molly.

I led her into the long hangar. It’s a huge place, packed full of all the early technological wonders produced down the ages by family Armourers with a bee in their bonnet. It had to be said: Both the museum and its exhibits had known better days. The inner walls were cracked and discoloured, and dull yellow sunlight fell through glass panels left cloudy and spotted by age and neglect. This was just a storage space now, for things whose time had moved on. Strange and wondrous artefacts that had once been ahead of their time, now overtaken and forgotten.

Like the 1880s Moon Launch Cannon, only used once. And the oversized Moleship, basically just a steel cabin with a bloody big diamond-studded drill head mounted on the front. It had been constructed to investigate the interior of the earth, back in the days when people still believed in the Hollow Earth theory. The hulking exhibit before us was actually Mole II, built so the family could go looking for whatever had happened to Mole I. In the end it never got used, because we had to fill in and block off the original tunnel after something big and nasty from the lower depths tried to crawl back up it.

“And we used to have a giant mechanical spider,” I said, leading Molly through the exhibits. “We confiscated it from some American mad genius, back in the Wild West. Not entirely sure what happened to it. I think it ran away.”

“Boys and their toys,” said Molly, smiling sweetly. “You’ll be boasting about the size of your engines next. Why keep all this stuff if you never use it anymore?”

“Because the family never lets go of anything that belongs to it,” I said. “Besides, this is history. It’s… interesting. Not to mention instructive. And you never know when you might need something again. Better to have a thing and not need it, than need it and not have it. Like the Time Train… I only remembered it was here because I used to love reading about things like that when I was a kid, and sloping off from my lessons.”

We weren’t alone in the hangar. A dozen or so men and women in scruffy overalls fussed around various exhibits, tinkering with the machinery or just polishing and cleaning them to within an inch of their lives. None of them looked at us, as long as we were careful to maintain a respectful distance. Molly gestured at them, and raised an eyebrow.

“Enthusiasts,” I said. “They all volunteer to work here in their spare time. All obsessed with a particular period, or device. They keep the exhibits in order, just for the joy of it. Express the slightest interest in their particular pride and joy, and they’ll talk your ear off.”

“Now, let me be sure I’ve got this right,” said Molly. “This Time Train you want to use… No one’s actually taken it out of the hangar in ages, it’s pretty damned dangerous even when it’s working properly, and the only guarantee we have it’ll work at all is some dedicated amateur technician? Have I missed anything? You are not filling me with confidence here, Eddie.”

By now we’d reached the Time Train, and the sheer size of the thing dwarfed all the other exhibits. The Time Train itself was a big, black, old-fashioned steam engine, gleaming and glistening like the night, with luxurious silver and brass fittings, all of them buffed and polished to a cheery warm glow. Haifa dozen luxury Pullman coaches, in the familiar milk chocolate and cream livery, stretched away behind the coal tender. A quick peek through the coaches’ curtained windows revealed a whole other world of seats and fittings whose quality would have shamed the Orient Express in its heyday. The family never did believe in doing things by half. The huge black engine towered over us like a sleeping beast, only waiting to be roused. A tall gangling individual appeared suddenly in the cab and smiled bashfully down at us.

“Oh hello,” he said. “Visitors, how nice. We don’t get many visitors, old Ivor and me. Ivor is the engine, you see.”

“Yes,” I said. “I had a hunch it might be. Molly, allow me to present to you the family’s one and only expert steam train engineer: Tony Drood. Latest in a long line of such enthusiasts, right Tony?”