The Empire of Glass - Andy Lane [92]
The Doctor gazed at the object with interest. "A telepathic storage unit," he said. "Very interesting: at the touch of a button, all the information contained in the unit is instantly transmitted into the mind of whoever is holding it. I seem to recognize the design as Vilp - I presume that you stole it from an envoy's room here at the Convention. I congratulate you - it appears that you have thought of everything."
"Not quite," a hesitant voice said from one side. Before anybody could move, William Shakespeare pushed past Braxiatel and snatched the control unit from Tzorogol's hand. Tzorogol lunged at him, but he backed out of the way. The other Jamarians weren't sure what to do. Two of them lowered their horns, ready to skewer Shakespeare. He, in his turn, gazed wildly around the hall, his hair plastered across his sweaty brow. "Ignorance is the curse of God: knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven," he cried.
Holding the unit to his forehead, he pressed the button.
The Jamarians stood stunned for a moment: just long enough for Shakespeare to drop the telepathic storage unit and run out of the hall. The Jamarians looked at each other and then, with a blood-chilling scream, ran after him. As their footsteps died away, peace settled once again on the hall. Braxiatel stepped forward to retrieve the telepathic unit.
"Are there any more surprises waiting to spring on us," the Doctor asked eventually, "or is this it for the time being?"
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The carved prow of the gondola lurched to the left, and Steven desperately waggled the long oar to straighten it out before the boat hit the side of the canal. The sun had dropped below roof level, and the water was mostly in shadow, making it difficult to steer into the waves which seemed to spring up out of nowhere and ricochet between crumbling walls and around corners before knocking the gondola sideways. Steven was having problems steering straight anyway: the effortless motions of the oars that he'd seen other gondoliers demonstrate eluded him completely, and even without the waves his progress along Venice's watery arteries was a bit haphazard. His muscles were aching with the strain of constantly heaving the thing back and forth, and the stench that rose from the water as he disturbed it made him want to throw up. If he did, he wouldn't be making the canal any less sanitary than it already was.
He glanced down at Christopher Marlowe. The man was propped up in the bows, looking for all the world like an aristocrat out for a quiet trip, rather than a dying playwright and spy with a silver machine in his chest cavity.
Marlowe must have realized that Steven was looking at him, for he turned back and winked. He coughed, and a small trickle of blood escaped his lips. Dabbing at it with a handkerchief, he smiled apologetically.
Someone had told Steven that there were twenty-eight miles of canal in Venice. Was he going to have to heave the gondola along all of them before he found what he was looking for?
They were coming up to a large church. The canal split in two, each branch hugging the church's walls, and Steven realized with a shock that its roof was lined with distorted winged figures. They were leaning forward, watching the gondola approach. Desperately he pulled on the oar, trying to turn the boat around before the aliens could do anything, but the figures weren't reacting. As momentum took the gondola closer, Steven saw their grey skin and their smooth, weathered features, and noticed with surprise that some of them were pointing their tongues out at him.
Gargoyles. He relaxed, feeling angry and ashamed at his panic.
They were just gargoyles.