Daemons Are Forever

“Yes, Eddie. About Molly…”

“Not now, Strange,” I said steadily. “We’ll talk about that later.”

“Yes, Eddie.”

“Is something wrong with you, Molly?” said the Armourer. “You look very pale. And Strange sounded worried about you.”

“Oh, it’s just something that happened during our trip through time,” Molly said easily.

She distracted him with details about the yellow dragon and the Starbow, while I wandered off to do some thinking of my own. I’d hoped to find some way of discussing Molly’s problem with Uncle Jack, but this new emergency had to take precedence. Twenty-seven infected family, all working secretly to undermine and betray us? No wonder the war had been going so badly in my absence. There had to be an original traitor, embedded deep within the family, passing on his infection… Or could it be a Typhoid Mary, not aware of what they were doing? Something in that thought reminded me of an old worry that I hadn’t checked in on since I returned. I looked around me. Molly had Uncle Jack chuckling at her stories. The lab interns were all engrossed in their own dangerous business. So I found a quiet corner, hidden away behind a blast shield, and took out Merlin’s Glass. I commanded it to show me the present.

“Show me Pe

My reflection in the mirror vanished, replaced by a view of Pe

“You don’t need to stand so far away. I trust you.”

“You shouldn’t,” said Mr. Stab.

“After all the time we’ve spent together? If you were going to hurt me, you would have done it long ago. But you’ve been here in the Hall for over a year, and you haven’t hurt anyone. You’re stronger than you think you are; I wish I could make you believe that.”

Mr. Stab smiled briefly. “If anyone could, it would be you.”

“Why won’t you tell me your real name? Mr. Stab isn’t a name; it’s a title, a job description.”

“You could always call me Jack.”

“No I couldn’t,” Pe

“Yes,” said Mr. Stab. “I have.”

He moved over and sat down beside her on the bed. His back was straight and stiff, and he kept his hands together in his lap. Pe

“I do care for you,” he said. “In my way.”

“It’s all right for you to care,” said Pe

“Yes,” said Mr. Stab. “I can love. I have. But it always ends badly.”

Pe

“My job is very different,” said Mr. Stab. “I have done…such terrible things, Pe

“Anyone can change,” said Pe

“I wish it was that simple, Pe

“It is that simple! And part of being in love is being together. Like this. How long has it been since you allowed yourself to be … close, to a woman?”

“A long time. I don’t want to hurt you, Pe

“You won’t! This is love, two people together. Just…let yourself go. Do what you want to. I want you to. It’s all right, really.”

“I love you, Pe

Pe

I grew the Merlin Glass to full size the moment I first saw the knife, and I was already through the Glass and heading for Mr. Stab by the second attack, but already I knew I was too late. Mr. Stab let go of Pe

“I tried to tell her,” he said. “Tried to warn her. That… is all the pleasure I can know of a woman, now. Part of what I bought, along with my immortality…from my celebration of slaughter, when all of London knew my name. That… is all the love I can show. All that’s left to me. I tried so hard … to stay away from her. But I am…what I am.”

“I told you,” I said, and I could hear the cold cold rage in my voice. “I told you what would happen if you didn’t control yourself.”

I armoured up, grew a long golden blade from my hand, stepped forward, and cut off his head with one savage blow. He didn’t move, didn’t try to evade the blow. My golden blade sheared right through his neck, and the head fell to the floor and rolled away, the eyes still blinking and the mouth still working. I stood before the headless body, breathing harshly from the rage and grief still burning within me, and only slowly realised that the body hadn’t fallen. It just stood there, by the door. No blood spurted from the neck stump. And as I watched, the body stepped slowly forward, reaching out with its hands. I backed quickly away, but it wasn’t interested in me. One hand reached down and grabbed the severed head by its hair. I made some kind of sound. I don’t know what. The body lifted up the head and put it back on the stump, and the wound healed in a moment, leaving no trace behind.

Mr. Stab looked at me expressionlessly. “You think no one ever tried that before? I’ve been beheaded, shot, poisoned, staked through the heart… I can’t die. That is what I bought with the deaths of five whores in 1888. Immortality, whether I want it or not. I’m Jack, Bloody Jack, Jack the Ripper, now and forever. And the only love I can ever know, the only pleasure I can ever have of a woman, is through the knife. Send me out into battle, Eddie. Maybe the Loathly Ones can find some way to kill me.”