Doctor Who_ Lungbarrow - Marc Platt [90]
Owis scarcely believed his luck. He had just discovered a new and brightly patterned woollen garment. And now a bowl of dried magentas was sitting unguarded on a kitchen table. They were supposed to improve with age, so after six and a half hundred years they must be. . . well, only one way to find out.
A hand cracked down on his shoulder.
'Did you hear that noise?' said Glospin. 'Like a machine?' Owis shook his head and wondered what Glospin was up to in the kitchen.
'In the old days,' Glospin continued, 'they'd cut off the fingers of anyone who was caught thieving. One by one.
Snip, snip. Wormhole always talked about the old days. If he ever became Kithriarch, I expect he'd bring them back.'
Owis pulled his hand away quickly.
'Never mind,' Glospin added. 'He isn't Kithriarch yet.'
A smile slowly creased across Owis's face. 'Bet you he never is.'
There was movement. A Drudge emerged through a cloud of steam. It hissed and gestured angrily at them.
'Supper soon,' said Glospin and watched Owis scurry away. 'So don't be too long about your business.'
The Doctor sits quietly, listening to the voices of his friend and his Cousin, coming from the depths of the library.
Badger, his oldest friend, stands like a sentinel beside him. The House is quiet. But there are sorts of quiet other than calmness. Sometimes before a moment of unexpected fear or violence, the wind drops, the birds fall silent and a hush of reverence for what wil happen settles across the world.
A ripple spreading backward across time from an inescapable event.
In her room, Satthralope coughs dryly. No food, only dregs and parings are left for the Otherstide supper. She waits in her chair for what the approaching moment will bring.
Jobiska, her frail bones aching, lies with her head in the fireplace, a telescope to her watering eye. High above, at the distant top of the chimney, she sees the sky change from white to black as a rain cloud hurries across.
In his glass-lidded casket set on the Loom of the House, Ordinal-General Quences can be seen sleeping, still as a corpse, until the time comes for his resurrection.
A tafelshrew, nosing about on the casket lid, is startled by the repeated echo of a growling engine. The creature darts for cover through a tiny black crack in the glass where, experience reminds it, it cannot be seen.
A grey figure in a long robe flickers along a passage on the third level. Old and angular. Shadows swirl in a cloak around him. Satthralope sees him in her mirror. The cold gruel spills from her shaking bowl.
137
The Doctor sat and watched the library door.
When the old man came through the wood, his dark cloak was bil owing slowly around him in the spectral wind.
The ornate hilt of a double-bladed dagger stuck out of his chest. Blood was stil running down his robe.
'Angels and ministers of grace defend us,' said the Doctor.
'Well?' replied the Ghost. 'Is that al ? No apologies?'
'For having murdered you?'
'For wrecking our plans.'
' Your plans, Quences, not mine.'
'Everything I have worked for. The work of thirteen lifetimes.'
'Which has probably turned to dust by now, thanks to Satthralope.' The Doctor directed the beam of a gun-shaped scanner at the Ghost. 'Better be careful, Quences. Your ectoplasmic levels are dangerously low. One might almost call them non-existent.'
The Ghost sat down in a chair without denting the dusty cushion. He studied the Doctor sadly. 'Over the centuries, this miserable House has produced nothing but servants and petty clerks. But you were different. You had a mind, and a cunning one at that. That's why I prepared your way.' The dagger hilt in his bloody chest had a fascinating way of bobbing up and down as he spoke.
The Doctor sniffed and glanced at Badger, who seemed oblivious of their conversation. How discreet he could be.
'You didn't do so badly, Quences. Ordinal-General of the Brotherhood of Kithriarchs is a fine achievement.'
'Oh, yes. A hard-won, hard-fought