Doctor Who_ Byzantium! - Keith Topping [29]
'And where is your "home"?' asked the man, taking a pace towards Vicki, his hand outstretched in a conciliatory gesture.
Vicki thought about telling the truth, but then decided that a cover story would save a lot of head-scratching and accusations of witchcraft. Probably. 'England. Britain. I'm not sure what you people call it,' she said. 'A place called...
TARDIS. You won't have heard of it. It's a small fishing village on the Thames. I was travelling the empire with...’
Now came an inspired piece of lying. 'My uncle and aunt. And my grandfather. I'm an orphan, do you see...?' Wonderfully instantaneous tears appeared in Vicki's eyes and she let out a wail of misery. 'l just want to see them all again.'
The man gave the woman an ominous look, then turned to face Vicki wearing a mask of pity. 'I am so sorry,' he said. 'If they were in that crowd with you then the chances are that they are dead.'
'No,' shouted Vicki. They can't be.'
The man tried to smile. 'Perhaps not,' he said, with a horribly false optimism. `But it is certainly not safe for anyone to be on the streets tonight. The Romans will seek out anyone that ventures abroad this night and do them a terrible vengeance. We can search for your family once the curfew hours are lifted.'
Vicki nodded and wiped a crocodile tear from her eye.
'Thank you,' she gulped, between sobs.
Ì am Georgiadis, the shopkeeper,' said the man. `This is my wife, Evangeline, and our daughter, Iola.'
'Hello,' said the girl, with the first words she had uttered since Vicki's sudden arrival. 'Welcome to our home.' There was a shy embarrassment in her voice that reminded Vicki of a childhood friend who, likewise, had difficulty in speaking unless it was absolutely necessary. From Iola, Vicki looked again at her mother. The frown on Evangeline's face was gradually beginning to seep away and be replaced by something less hostile and industrial. Not kitten-soft and fluffy, exactly, but at least a bit less abrasive. And then there was Georgiadis. Handsome and dignified, a thin and wiry frame that spoke of many meals missed so that others could eat instead.
A watery grin appeared on Vicki's face. 'Thank you. Thank you all. I'll try not to get in the way, really I will. Just please don't kill me.’
Chapter Ten
The Culture Bunker, Part Two –
Spies Like Us
And as he went out of the temple,
one of his disciples saith unto him,
Master; see what manner of stones
and what buildings are here!
Mark 13:1
A temple can be made to assume many roles. A house of worship. A thing of beauty, or divinity, or hope. Or, to the cynical, it is merely bricks and mortar. A shell into which spiritual belief is poured in the mistaken assumption that this makes the husk, by definition, a holy thing, in itself.
And then there are those to whom a temple offers sanctuary in a literal, as well as a metaphorical, way.
Somewhere to hide.
Barbara Wright had a phrase in her mind as she staggered, her head bloodied and sore, towards the temple door. It had taken the last of her strength to reach this far, through a maze of doorways, winding alleys, cul-de-sacs and dead ends. ‘My body is a temple.'
She was trying, in vain, to remember where the quotation was actually from. What the context was. Who had said it, and why. The situation was similar to her first year at university when she had become drunk for the first (and so far only) time and had needed to negotiate a lengthy mile-and-a-half trek through darkest Cricklewood with only the most basic of directional and sensory equipment still functioning in her brain. She had invented a little game attempting to read, out loud, road signs and car number plates. Anything, in fact, that would help her to stay alert while simultaneously cursing the very name of the spotty, immature legal student who had introduced her to the satanic qualities of gin and tonic.
Herbert Effemy.