He looked at her a moment longer, gave her an irresolute smile, then turned back to Noah. “Noah, will you come with me tonight? I thought—”
Noah took a deep breath. “You want to try—?”
“Yes.”
Grace went white. “No,” she said, “that’s too dangerous!”
“Grace,” said Jack, “I promise we’ll be careful, but we do need to do this. We need to probe this labyrinthine puzzle, or at the very least we need to probe Catling’s strength. We will be careful, but we can’t hang about gathering information piecemeal. Too many people will die.”
She stared at him, then turned away.
Jack looked after her, sighed, and turned to Matilda. “Can you and Grace cope with the canteen tonight? Where are Ecub and Erith—can they help you?”
Matilda nodded. “They’re already waiting at the Elephant and Castle for us, Jack.” Then, more quietly, “I’ll watch out for her, Jack. We’ll be fine. But you be careful, all right?”
“All right, Matilda,” Jack said. He grinned, gave her a peck on the cheek, and turned back to Noah.
They stood in Carter Lane just south of the cathedral. The lane was narrow and bounded by four-storey buildings, but still St Paul’s loomed over them. Even when they kept their heads low, and stood in the shelter of a doorway, they could feel its presence in every sinew of their bodies and with every breath they took.
They could feel it calling to them. It was subtle, but it was unrelenting, and within an hour of coming to stand so close to the cathedral both Jack and Noah were feeling slightly sickened by it.
The labyrinth knew they were close.
They stood in the doorway of a solicitor’s office. As doorways went it was reasonably commodious, but its overhang did nothing to impart any sense of safety either from the labyrinth’s call or from the terrible menace of the Luftwaffe planes overhead. For four hours they had stood in this doorway, barely moving, listening, as wave after wave of bombers swept over, tensing every time they heard the whistle of bombs falling, jumping at the terrible crump of bombs detonating.
Jack had his arm about Noah’s shoulder as she leaned in against him. Apart from the occasional movement, they’d been standing almost motionless for the entire four hours.
They’d been immersing themselves in the power of the labyrinth that Brutus and Genvissa had made atop Og’s Hill and which now rested deep within the earth beneath St Paul’s.
They were not Jack and Noah so much as Kingman and Mistress of the Labyrinth.
By two a.m. they’d tested the strength of the labyrinth, as well as tested their own combined abilities to use it. Additionally, and very, very carefully, they’d been probing at the Troy Game’s defences, trying to identify any chink in its armour.
All without alerting Catling to what they were doing, although both believed she must have known of their presence.
Feel the life of the city, Jack said in Noah’s mind.
Aye, she said. Feel the movement of its peoples, mirroring the winding of the labyrinth. Feel the waters of the Thames, the purr of the traffic, the dreams of the sleepers. Feel the labyrinth, winding its way through everything.
“Harmonies,” Jack whispered, aloud this time. Everything was harmonies, and every overlapping and intertwining layer of harmony increased the power available both to the labyrinth and to Jack and Noah.
Noah closed her eyes, leaning closer to Jack, feeling the heat of his body through the thick material of his uniform. It felt so good to be here with him like this, in such accord, merging her powers so tightly, so cleanly, with his.
Finally, after so many missteps, so many mistakes, so many long, terrible years…
“Jack,” she whispered, “can we use the shadow?”
Jack had spent the past hour probing at it with his and Noah’s combined power. But whatever he did, he couldn’t touch it, couldn’t understand it any better, and, if he were honest with himself, he was slightly relieved about that. Despite being almost certain that the shadow was a reflected weakness of the Troy Game, that “almost” niggled at him. If it wasn’t a weakness, and he woke the shadow from its sleep…and if it were as malevolent as Grace and Weyland believed…
No, that was too awful to contemplate.
No, he replied. It is closed to us. But if we can use the harmonies to influence one of those bombs to penetrate Catling’s defences, then we will be that little bit surer that the shadow is a reflection of a weakness in the Troy Game itself rather than anything…else.
There was nothing else that it could be.
Surely?
“Jack…”
“I know,” he murmured against her hair. “I am frightened as well.”
“If we mishandle this…”
“I know.” Jack paused. “But we’ve got to try.”
Do we? she wondered, but there was no strength behind that thought, and Jack ignored it.
Can you feel the squadron flying overhead now? he said to her. Feel the plane on the northern flank? Sense the bombs in its belly?
Aye, she replied.
Do you feel that bomb which lies cradled in the heart of its rack, feel its intent?
Aye. She could feel it as if it were her own child. She knew its history, knew its sorrows, knew its joys. Do you want me to use my Darkcraft? she asked Jack.
He trembled, and she thought he might pull away, but almost immediately he relaxed again. Will it help?
Yes.
Then use it.
She reached out and took his hand, squeezing it gently.
Are you ready? he said.
Yes.
Then let us do it, said Jack, and Noah felt his arm tighten about her shoulder, felt his heart begin to race through the layers of material between them, felt his power surge into her, and embrace hers…
And together they wrapped the bomb about with harmonies.
George Heall, one of the members of the Watch, was sitting on the west steps of the cathedral enjoying a smoke when he suddenly lifted his head, the cigarette frozen lifted halfway to his mouth.
Far above he could hear the whistle of a bomb.
It was strange, because the sound of the planes overhead combined with the ack-ack and the explosions, as well as the sirens and the creak and crackle of distant flames, meant that the whistling of bombs should be all but drowned out.
But this one was so clear it could almost be directly—
“Christ!” Heall said, tossing his cigarette to one side as he leapt to his feet. He took one step towards the door into the cathedral when an enormous blast threw him off his feet, and tumbled him down the flight of steps to the pavement.
He managed to stop himself just before he rolled over the side of a massive crater. Heall lay there, fingers gripping the fractured pavement, his body and hair coated with fine blast debris, coughing in the thick dust, and staring deep into the crater where, so he swore later to his wife, he could see the glowing fins of the German bomb embedded in the earth some twelve feet down.
He thought the bomb was still alive, and ticking towards a cataclysmic detonation. He thought he had only seconds to get out of there if he wanted to live.
But still he could not move.
When, three minutes later, eight other members of the cathedral Watch clattered down the steps towards the crater not fifteen feet away, Heall was still lying there, body heaving as he coughed the dust out of his lungs, staring as if transfixed at the bomb.
As soon as they felt the bomb impact Jack and Noah vanished, reappearing a moment later under the stand of trees to one side of Copt Hall.
Both were laughing.
“Why are we laughing,” Noah said, “when it didn’t go off?”
“It may not have exploded,” Jack said, “but if Catling had been as strong as she wants us to believe then the bomb shouldn’t have come anywhere near St Paul’s.”
“Then the Game is weakened?”
Jack sobered. “Yes. I think so. No, I’m sure so. There’s no other explanation, either for the success of our little enterprise tonight or for that echo of the labyrinth about London. That shadowy presence is a reflection of the power of the Troy Game leaching out. It has to be.”
What else could it be?
“Then the Troy Game is vulnerable.”
“Yes. Yes.”
“Jack, you need your kingship bands. With those you’ll be infinitely more powerful.”
He nodded slowly. “The spring equinox will be the best time to hand them over—the equinox is a time of power, and will be a good day to regain the kingship bands. That isn’t far away.” He drew in a deep breath. “The kingship bands. After all these years…”
She leaned a little closer to him. “I will fetch them from the Faerie for you.”