And with the Heart finally destroyed, all the souls that had been trapped within it for so long were finally set free. They manifested briefly on the still air of the Sanctity, one after another, flashing on and off, countless shimmering forms exploding like so many soundless fireworks in one last display of joy at their freedom before finally passing on to whatever comes next. Molly cried out in delight, clapping her hands together.
And at the very end, one small soul came to me. My twin. My brother. He hung on the air before me, just a baby, only a few days old, and then he expanded suddenly into adult form, my size, my age. He looked…like the face I see in the mirror every day, only without all the lines driven into it by pain, and loss, and duty. My brother considered me for a long moment, and then he smiled at me, and winked, and was gone.
And that was that.
Epilogue
With the Heart gone, the Sanctity didn’t feel like the Sanctity anymore. It felt like the quiet after the explosion, the calm after the storm, the incredible peace of waking up and knowing that the nightmare is finally over. The Sanctity was just an empty room now, wide and echoing, with a layer of sand on the floor. The dragon was dead, but I didn’t feel like a dragonslayer.
"How do you feel, Eddie?" said Molly.
"Pretty good," I said. "The pain is gone, the weakness is gone, and I’m back to normal again."
"No, Eddie," she said gently. "How do you feel?"
"I don’t know," I said. "Numb. Lost…I used to know what I was, what my life was all about. Then that was taken away from me. I used to have a family, and that’s gone too. All gone…"
"You still have me," said Molly.
"Do I?"
She put her hands on my shoulders, pulled me in close, and kissed me. "Try to get rid of me, idiot."
"So," I said after a while. "The Heart’s dead. What do we do now?"
"You mean for an encore?" said Molly. "Haven’t you done enough?"
The door behind us swung open, and we both spun around, ready to defend ourselves, but it was just the Armourer and the ghost of old Jacob. Molly and I relaxed a little as they came over to join us. The Armourer’s face was still half buried under dried blood, but he looked a lot steadier on his feet. Jacob had resumed his grumpy old ghost form, with garish Hawaiian shorts and a grubby T-shirt bearing the legend Dead Men Don’t Eat Quiche.
"Eddie, my boy," said the Armourer. "Are you okay? We heard all kinds of noises from in here, but we couldn’t get in till now. Not even Casper the Unfriendly Ghost here. And what the hell happened to the Heart?"
"Look down," I said. "You’re standing in what’s left of it."
He looked down, winced, and then shook his head. "So that’s what Oath Breaker does. I always wondered."
"Here," I said, handing the ironwood staff back to him. "The sooner this is back in the Armageddon Codex, the safer we’ll all be. Molly, give him Torc Cutter."
"Oh poo," said Molly, pouting. "I was hoping to keep it as a souvenir."
The Armourer gave her one of his hard looks, and she handed the shears over without another word.
"So," I said, "that’s it, at last. All over. Someone lead me to a comfortable chair and place a nice cup of tea in my hand. It’s been a busy few days…but at least it’s finished now."
"You have got to be joking," the Armourer said sternly. "After all the damage you’ve done here, you think you can just sit back and take it easy? You’ve done more in one evening to bring the Drood family to its knees than centuries of enemy action. It’s up to you to save the family, Eddie. I didn’t bring you up to leave a job half done. You brought the family down; only you can raise it up again."
"To hell with that!" Molly said sharply. "This is what I lived for: to see the high and mighty Droods humbled and forced to their knees, made to live down here in the dirt with the rest of us. Don’t listen to him, Eddie. You’ve taken the Droods’ foot off the neck of everyone in the world. We’re free at last!"
"Free?" I said, reluctantly. "No, Molly. It’s not that simple, and it never was. Truman’s Manifest Destiny is still out there, remember? Free from Drood influence and control and still determined to wipe out everything that doesn’t fit their narrow definition of normal and human. Who’s going to stop them, if not the family? And then there are all the other dark forces only kept in check by fear of what the family would do if they ever got out of hand. There has to be another power in place to stop the forces of darkness from overrunning the world. But if there has to be a Drood family, it’s going to be a new kind of family."
"Now you’re talking," said Jacob. "Always knew you were destined for great things, Eddie. Even if I couldn’t remember why."
I considered him thoughtfully. "You just remembered you were only hanging about here in order to help me destroy the Heart…So, and don’t take this the wrong way, but…why are you still here?"
He gave me his usual shifty grin and shrugged vaguely. Little bubbles of blue-gray ectoplasm jumped up from his shoulders before slowly settling back into him again. "Guess I’ve just got used to hanging around here. And besides, I really am curious to see what’s going to happen next. I haven’t had so much fun since the Great Gender Swap of 1741. We never did find out who was behind that…"
"I don’t see Alexandra or Matthew," I said carefully. "What have you done with them, Jacob?"
He met my gaze easily, and just for a moment something of his old terrifying self surfaced in his gaze. "They won’t be coming back. Ever."
"Don’t ask," the Armourer said stiffly. "Trust me, you really don’t want to know."
"Poor Alex," I said, and I meant it.
"Just what was this Alex person to you, anyway?" said Molly.
"It was more…what she might have been," I said. "If things had gone differently."
"Oh…" said Molly. "Yeah. I’ve had lots of relationships like that."
I looked at her for a moment. "I won’t ask," I said finally.
"Best not to," she agreed.
And then, finally, I looked at the Armourer, my uncle Jack, and said the one thing I’d been putting off, the one thing I knew I’d have to say the moment I saw him coming through the door. "I’m sorry, Uncle Jack. I’m really sorry, but…Uncle James is dead."
"I know," said the Armourer. "You couldn’t have done anything else, Eddie. James wouldn’t have given you any other choice. For him, the family always came first. And he never could say no to Mother."
"He was supposed to kill me on the motorway," I said. "But he let me go. Gave me a chance…made all this possible."
"Good for him," said the Armourer. "Maybe he was growing up, at last. So, the Gray Fox is dead…Good bartenders and bad women will be weeping bitter tears in bars all around the world once word gets out."
There was no point in telling him that Molly had actually killed my uncle James. The family was going to have enough problems accepting her as it was.
Jacob fixed me with a firm look. "You have to address the family, Eddie. Here, now! Explain to them what’s been going on. They need to know the truth. I’ll summon them here, and you can tell them what needs to be done to put the family back together again."