Sera came to stand beside him, his expression cold and calm.
Redlock, sniffing like a cokehead, was on his other shoulder.
Before them, the bike was closing at impossible speed, the sound ringing from the stones. Maugrim’s eager stance was challenging the tavern wall to a game of chicken.
Roderick had joined them, Triqueta. Karine’s hand closed around her cosh. Kale had retreated to the kitchen, his worn face tense. None of them moved.
As it screamed past the last fallen sarsen and into the garden, the bike turned sideways, fell and skidded to a halt, throwing out a wall of dirt and soil. The awful noise cut out, and Maugrim’s voice, shouting something, rang in Ecko’s ears. The greaser scrambled to his feet, didn’t bother to pick the bike up. It lay there like a corpse, rear wheel idly turning, tyre packed with the dirt of the Varchinde.
Maugrim stepped over it, grinning. His t-shirt and cut-down were soaked in blood and oil and sweat, there was a livid bruise around his throat.
“Hello there, Rick,” he said. “Good to see you.” He spread his hands, weaponless, surrendering. “It’s a fair cop, guv. You got me. I’m handing myself in.”
* * *
“So,” Ecko said, his voice a chainsaw rasp. “Look what the cat dragged in.”
They’d sat the smirking Maugrim at the table’s end, the rocklight glimmering on his dirt-stained skin. The faint scent of smoke lingered in the air.
Redlock watched him closely, as if the axeman was itching to finish what he’d started.
“The Ecko.” Maugrim was carefully casual, leaning back, half his face in shadow, his hair a halo of unholy illumination. “The one and only. Bit lost aren’t you? Last anyone heard, the Ecko had sold out and joined Lugan’s strike team – pitting themselves in a doomed war against the might of Pilgrim Products Inc. Guess you weren’t as tough as you thought.”
“You know Lugan?” Ecko said. “Oh chrissakes, who the hell’m I kidding? You’re my end-of-level nasty – of course you fucking know Lugan.”
“Everyone knows Lugan.” Maugrim grinned. “Where d’you think I got the bike?”
Round them, Karine was bustling, herbal and plates of food. Sera watched the door.
“Shame you didn’t bring him with you – he probably is as hard as he thinks he is.” He picked up the herbal, eyed it warily. “You, Ecko, you messed up. You died.”
Died?
Landed on the tarmac like a lump of...
“Yeah, right.” Ecko was tense, adrenals flickering. He was aware of Amethea’s bruised stare, Redlock’s pacing agitation. “I didn’t fucking die.” The ’bot, the screaming London weather, falling. “Eliza put me here to Save the World.”
Even as he said it, it sounded ridiculous.
“Eliza!” The name was a guffaw. “They’d waste that sort of expense on you? I’m in the profession, you might say. And I know your profile, Gabriel – you’re a screw-up, a screaming pyrophile, a madman. Untreatable.” He was still laughing. “And now a megalomaniac. Save the World, my left nut.”
I know your profile, Gabriel. Ecko found that he was crouched on his seat, trembling. Gabriel. He spat, “My profile?”
“Steady, my friend,” Roderick said quietly. “I know his trickeries of old – he baits you.”
Amethea’s voice was soft. “Don’t trust him.”
“Your profile.” Maugrim had lost his laughter, his voice was cold. “This isn’t some psychoprogram, you little freak, your own personal Virtual Rorschach.” The word was spat. “Who the hell would care about you that much?”
I am the pattern, the pattern spreads from me.
Megalomaniac.
His voice as clear as blind faith, Roderick said, “We do. He came here to help us.”
“I’m the one helping you, you bloody lunatic.” Maugrim was on his feet. “You know this, Rick – you explained it to me! You’re stagnant, no progress – your people have just let everything go, forgotten their lore and culture, forgotten it all. Like Pilgrim – it’s all apathy! Terhnwood and trade and tedium. Passionless. You know what I mean – we should tear it down, kick over the anthill. Progress has to happen or we’ll all fucking rot.”
Triqueta muttered, “You call that progress?”
“Of course I do!” Maugrim jabbed a ringed finger at her. “This is a fantasy, right? Sword’n’saucery, good’n’evil, law’n’chaos – Ecko, you know this shit as well as I do. And fantasy worlds have to have the Bad Guy, the Necromancer, the Lord of Dark – why? Because without him – or her – paradise’d be pointless. Unchallenged, unremarked. How can you get achievement with no struggle, satisfaction with no effort? How do you value anything when it’s just handed to you?”
How can you value anything...?
Ecko was caught. His own beliefs, distorted, slung back at him like a handful of toxic mud.
“This ends now.” Redlock muttered darkly. The axeman, at least, was clear of purpose. “All of it.”
“It’ll never end, warrior. While your terhnwood grows, while your trade cycles, you’ll disappear so far up your own arseholes you’ll lose sight of everything else. In the end, you’ll whine about the small shit because it’s all you’ll have left.”
Roderick said, “Wait a minute – wait. You said, ‘While your terhnwood grows...’ What’s going to happen to it? Phylos...?” His voice faded into horror, anticipation and realisation. “What is Phylos going to do?”
Maugrim laughed, threw his head back and guffawed at the ceiling. “You’re not as bloody green as you’re cabbage-looking, are you, Rick?”
“By the Gods.” The Bard was out of his seat. “I’ll carve the damned answer out of your skin if I have to! What is Phylos going to do?”
Maugrim stretched, grinned like a challenge.
But Ecko was no longer paying attention. In Maugrim’s zeal, he’d heard The Boss’s philosophy, Lugan’s battle against Pilgrim, the death of the woman he’d burned on the shit-hole bed.
Take away the big shit – it’ll be all you’ve got left.
As Maugrim faced the Bard, Ecko’s breathing was tightening, his boosting half kicked. He was poised on the precipice of its speed, its certainty... He wanted to embrace it, it would surge beyond doubt, beyond conscience... but he dared not let it go. The Sical’s might may scream in his veins, but its master was here – here, from his own world, from his own head.
This isn’t some psychoprogram, you little freak, your personal Virtual Rorschach.
What if... Chrissakes! His own doubts, his flickers of emotion and compassion. What if this was real? He couldn’t wrap his brain round the possibility. What if there was no program – what if... Panic was closing his throat. The walls of the tavern were dark, closed-in. There were weapons everywhere he looked.
“We’ve got every right to carve your answer from you.” Amethea’s voice was clear, cold. “You’ve committed torture, rape, murder, corruption – you’ve rained fire from the sky, set your creatures on Roviarath and that – thing – would’ve torn the Varchinde asunder.” She was as calm as still water. “I’ll wield the damned blade myself.”
“Little priestess, Amethea.” His voice was almost affectionate. “Your crimes are as bad as mine – and you know it.”
“No more, Maugrim.” She stood up. “No more head games, no more trickery, no more coercion. No more blood. Feren was my friend, my responsibility, his courage puts all of us to shame. I’ll pay whatever dues I have to – but you must answer for everything you’ve done. And not just to me.”