“Just…visiting,” said Mr. Stab. He smiled vaguely, showing large, blocky teeth grown brown with age. He gestured at the graves around him. “Once this was a fashionable place, with people just dying to get in. Special trains brought the fortunate deceased here from all over the country. Long ago now, and no one remembers anymore. Except me. I have friends and family here, people who knew me when I was just a man. The last people to remember me as I was, before I became a name to frighten people with.”
I found it hard to think of Mr. Stab as ever being normal, with a normal life, and he must have sensed it, because he made a brief dismissive gesture and looked at me coldly.
“What do you want with me, Edwin Drood?”
I explained the situation, but he was shaking his head even before I finished. “What makes you think I would be so foolish and trusting, to place myself into the hands of my long-time enemies? More importantly, even if you could manage to convince me of my safety, why should I go to the one place where I would never be allowed to kill? I must murder, Edwin. It is my nature.”
“After the tutoring is done,” I said, “you can murder as many Loathly Ones as you like.”
“The Droods have opened up their old library,” said Molly. “Packed full of forgotten and forbidden texts from centuries back. Somewhere in that Library there must be information on how to … if not reverse, at least moderate the conditions of your immortality. Give you some control over it. So you wouldn’t have to kill all the time.”
Mr. Stab considered her thoughtfully. “And what makes you think I want that?”
“Because you’ve refrained from killing me, and my friends,” said Molly. “And I’ve never known you do that for anyone else.”
He nodded slowly. “You want me to do this thing, Molly? Even though you must know it can only end in tears?”
“I want you to do this, so it won’t,” said Molly.
“Then so be it,” said Mr. Stab.
I opened the Merlin Glass to the Armoury, and waved Mr. Stab through. He was greeted by a very harried-looking Armourer, and I shut the mirror down quickly before Uncle Jack could say anything. He looked very much like he wanted to say something, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t anything I wanted to hear. I put the Glass away and turned to Molly.
“I think we’ve done enough for one day, don’t you? I think we’re owed a little downtime, before we have to report back. What shall we do?”
“Well,” said Molly, linking her arm through mine, “I did promise you a good meal, and since we’re in London for the evening…What say we take in a West End show, and have dinner afterwards at the Ritz?”
“Sounds good to me,” I said. “But we’ll never get tickets for anything decent at such short notice.”
“I’m a witch, sweetie, remember? Trust me, tickets are not going to be a problem.”
I thought it best to give the family time to adjust to their new tutors before I showed my face at the Hall again, so a show and a nice meal it was. We went to see the new production at Shaftesbury Avenue: Prince of Thieves: The Musical. Starring Robbie Williams as Robin Hood, Paris Hilton as Maid Marion, and Ricky Gervais as the Sheriff. Music, book, and lyrics by no one you’ve ever heard of. Tickets were not a problem; Molly did a Jedi mind trick with the theatre staff, and we ended up in a private box. Afterwards we went to the Ritz and ordered the very best of everything, secure in the knowledge that we had no intention of paying for any of it.
Hey, I keep the world safe and humanity protected. I’m entitled to a few perks and privileges.
“An interesting production,” I said to Molly over pieces of lightly browned toast piled high with Beluga caviar.
“Yes…but why is there such a preoccupation with translating successful films into stage shows? And why didn’t they sing the Bryan Adams song? It’s all most people remember about the film anyway.”
Several bottles of really good champagne later, we stiffed the waiter with an imaginary credit card, tangoed giggling down the Ritz steps, and used the Merlin Glass to take us home. We stepped through into the Armoury, where the Armourer was waiting for us. He did not look at all happy.
“What the hell did you think you were doing, landing me with those four psychopaths? I have enough trouble looking after the psychopaths who work under me! And I have more than enough work to do, without babysitting your special-needs friends!”
I looked around, but there was no sign of any of my tutors. I fixed the Armourer with an only slightly owlish look.
“Uncle Jack, what have you done with them?”
He sniffed loudly. “I handed them over to Penny, and let her take care of them. You know she loves organising things. And people.”
I looked at him, shocked suddenly stone cold sober. “You did what? She’ll never be able to handle a dangerous bunch like that! The Blue Fairy alone could walk all over Penny without even raising a sweat, never mind Mr. Stab! Where are they now?”
“I’m sure I don’t know. Ask Penny. Now get out of here. I’ve got a pocket universe that needs stabilising.”
I activated my mental link with Strange, in the Sanctity.
“Red alert, emergency, emergency!”
“Oh, hello Eddie! Welcome back. Did you have a nice time in town? Did you bring me back a present?”
“Never mind that now…”
“You didn’t, did you. You forgot all about me.”
“Where’s Penny, and the four tutors she’s supposed to be looking after?”
“At the lecture auditoriums, of course. She’s already got the first tutorials up and running. It’s all terribly exciting!”
I cut contact with Strange, before I said something one of us would regret, and used the Merlin Glass to transport Molly and me straight to the lecture halls in the south wing. I had this horrible mental picture of a lecture hall full of dead Droods, with blood running down the aisles while Janissary Jane and Mr. Stab played football with their severed heads…But when we arrived in the lobby outside the auditoriums, all seemed calm and quiet. Penny was walking unhurriedly back and forth, listening at first one door and then the next. She jumped a little as Molly and I appeared through the Glass, and then hurried over to us, making shushing gestures.
“Thanks a whole bunch for dropping those four on me!” she said, the effect somewhat limited by her hushed tone.
“Blame the Armourer,” I said automatically. “Where are they, Penny? Has there been any trouble?”
“None at all,” said Penny. “I thought the best thing to do was put them all to work straightaway. Let the family see what they could do. So I gave them an auditorium each, told them to talk about what the hell they liked, and…much to my surprise, they took to it like ducks to water. It’s all worked out rather well. It’s standing room only, for all four lecture halls, and when was the last time that happened?”
“And there haven’t been any…incidents?” said Molly.
“Not yet,” said Penny. “A part of me keeps waiting for the other bomb to drop.”
“Why are we whispering?” I said.
Penny raised an eyebrow. “Well, we don’t want to interrupt them, do we?”
I moved over to the nearest door and slipped quietly through to stand at the back of the lecture hall. Molly was quickly there at my side. Subway Sue was up on the stage, striding back and forth, hitting the fascinated packed audience with what it was like to live on the very edges of society. To be in the city, but not part of it, alone and unsupported, surviving entirely on your wits.
“You don’t know how easy it is, to fall off the edge,” she said. “All it would take is one really bad day, and any one of you could end up just like me. I had a home and job and a life, once. I had friends and family. And then I lost them all, one by one. Lost them, or had them taken from me. And so I ended up a homeless person, living on the streets, because even after everything else is gone, the streets are always there. In time I became a luck vampire, and made a new life for myself. I could have had my old life back, but I didn’t want it anymore. I’d become somebody else, and my old life wouldn’t have fit. But, once again, all it took was one really bad day, and I lost it all again. The one thing you have to learn is never to depend on anyone but yourself. Because there’s nothing you can have that the world can’t take away.”