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"That’s the skull of a vodyanoi from pre-Soviet Russia. Those are genuine Thuggee strangling cords from the Hindu Kush. That lumpy-looking hairy thing is a badly stuffed Chupacabras from Chile. Which if anything smells worse dead than it does when it’s alive. And all the intricate carvings in that cabinet are scrimshaw carved from the bones of a great white whale."
"You should charge admittance to the Hall," said Molly. "You could make a fortune out of the summer trade."
The door ahead of us slammed open and my grandmother Martha Drood, the family Matriarch herself, strode into the room to face me, accompanied as always by her consort, Alistair. I stopped abruptly, facing them, and they stopped where they were, maintaining a cautious distance. Molly moved in close beside me, reassuring and supporting me with her presence. I was glad she was there. Even after all that had happened, after all that I’d discovered…Martha was still the Matriarch, the will and authority of the Droods. And once I would have died rather than fail her.
The Matriarch wasn’t wearing her armour. Of course not. That might have come across as an admission of weakness, and Martha’s arrogance would never allow her to see me as a serious threat. Not even after all I’d done. For a rogue to triumph against the will of the family was unthinkable.
So I armoured down too. Just to show my contempt.
"Hello, Grandmother," I said. "Alistair. How did you know where to find me?"
Alistair smirked. "Intercepting your path wasn’t exactly difficult, Edwin. All we had to do was follow the wreckage and destruction, draw a straight line to the Sanctity, and then get here ahead of you."
"You always were very direct, even as a child," said the Matriarch.
"That’s why I chose this room, for our…little chat. The number of times I had to send someone to drag you out of here because you weren’t where you were supposed to be…You always were such a disappointment to me, Edwin."
Molly looked at me. "It’s your family, Edwin. How do you want to handle this?"
"Very carefully," I said. "My grandmother wouldn’t be in here, facing me without serious backup, unless she was confident she had some really nasty cards to play."
"This is the Drood Matriarch?" said Molly. "Well, colour me impressed. The queen bitch of the family that runs the whole world. Hatchet-faced old cow, isn’t she?"
The Matriarch ignored her, fixing me with her cold gaze. "Where is James?" she said harshly. "What did you do to James?"
"I…killed him, Grandmother," I said.
She cried out briefly then; a lost, devastated sound. She crumpled as though I’d hit her and might have fallen if Alistair hadn’t been there to hold her up. She pressed her face against his chest, eyes squeezed shut to keep the tears from falling. Alistair glared at me over her bent head. I wanted to see her suffer for what she’d done to me, to all of us, even to Uncle James, but in the end it was disturbing and even sad to see such a legendary facade crack and fall apart right in front of me. I’d never seen her show any honest emotion in public before.
"You killed my son," she said finally, pushing herself away from Alistair. "My son…your uncle…He was the best of us! How could you, Edwin?"
"You sent him to his death, Grandmother," I said steadily. "Just like you tried to send me to mine on the motorway. Remember?"
I stepped forward to confront her with all the other things I had to say, but to my surprise Alistair stepped forward to face me, putting himself between his wife and the rogue who threatened her. He stood tall and proud, doing his best to stare me down, and for the first time, he actually looked like a Drood.
"Get out of my way, Alistair," I said.
"No." His voice was high but steady. He had no authority, no power, and he knew it, but in his refusal to remove himself from the line of fire, he had a kind of dignity at last. "I won’t let you hurt her anymore."
"I don’t want to hurt her," I said almost tiredly. "I don’t want to hurt anyone. That’s not why I came back. But I have something important to do and not much time to do it in. Take her out of here, Alistair."
"No. This ends here."
"I have Oath Breaker," I said. "And Molly has Torc Cutter. Even the Gray Fox couldn’t stand against that."
"You used Torc Cutter on your own uncle?" Alistair looked at me with horror. "Dear God; what have you become, Edwin?"
"I don’t know," I said honestly. "Awake, perhaps, to all the lies and betrayals…It’s time to cut the rotten heart out of the family."
"I have a weapon too," Alistair said abruptly, and just like that there was an old-fashioned pistol in his right hand. It would have looked primitive, even pathetic, if I hadn’t recognised it. If I hadn’t known it for what it was. Alistair nodded grimly, seeing the knowledge in my face. Even Martha was shaken out of her grief by the sight of the gun.
"Alistair! Wherever did you get that? You can’t use it! I forbid it!"
"I’ll do whatever I have to to protect you, Martha." Alistair was looking at me, but the gun was trained steadily on Molly. "You stand very still, Edwin. Or I’ll hurt your woman, just as you’ve hurt mine. I know none of you ever really thought of me as one of the family. Never thought I had it in me to fight the good fight like the rest of you. But I love this family and all it stands for, just as I’ve always loved you, Martha. And this is where I prove it."
"Please, Alistair," said Martha, trying for a calm and reasonable voice.
"Put away the gun. Let me handle this."
"How can you love the family?" I said to Alistair. "Knowing what you do about the Heart? About the price we pay to be what we are?"
He frowned, suddenly uncertain. "Martha? What’s he talking about?"
I looked at Martha. "He doesn’t know, does he, Grandmother? You never told him. Never told him why he can’t ever wear the golden torc."
"He’s not part of the council," she said dully. "He never needed to know, so I never told him. It would have been…cruel. You always were too softhearted, Alistair."
"Not here, not now," he said. "Not when he dares to threaten you and the whole family. You do know what this gun is, don’t you, Edwin? Of course you do. Why don’t you tell your little witch friend what it is?"
"Yes, Eddie," said Molly. "You know I hate to be left out of things."
"That…is a Salem Special," I said. "It’s a witch killer. It shoots flames summoned up from Hell itself. Or so the records say. No one’s used the awful thing in centuries." I glared at Alistair. "I can’t believe you’re even thinking of using a Salem Special. You put your soul at risk just by handling it."
"It’ll stop you, and that’s all that matters," he said. He smiled briefly, nervously. "Fight fire with fire, eh? Oh, I know it won’t hurt you, Eddie. You’ll get your armour up in time to protect you. But it’ll do terrible things to your pretty girlfriend…So you’re going to stand very still, Edwin, until the rest of the family get here, take your weapons away, and put you under arrest. Or I’ll burn your woman alive before your eyes."
"Don’t be a fool, Alistair!" snapped the Matriarch, some of her old authority returning. "You’re not a field agent! I protected you from all that!"
"I never asked you to protect me, Martha."
"He’ll kill you!"
"You never did have any faith in me," said Alistair. "But this is where I prove you all wrong. You thought you could stop him with your authority, thought you could intimidate him into just giving up. I never believed that. He was never intimidated by authority in his life. But look at him now. Look at him! Afraid to move a muscle because of me!"
He took his eyes off me to glare at her, and that was all I needed. In the moment when he was distracted, I whipped Oath Breaker out from under my belt, and brought it around in a swift arc. He started to turn back, raising the Salem Special, but the long ironwood staff undid the binding seals on the ancient pistol, and it exploded, all its stored hellfire bursting out at once. Supernaturally bright flames consumed Alistair’s hand and arm, burning the meat down to the bone in seconds. The stench of brimstone and burnt flesh filled the air. Alistair fell back, howling and shrieking. He flapped his arm wildly, as though he could shake off the flames. What remained of his right hand fell away as the hellfire consumed the small co