Daemons Are Forever

“What do you want, Harry?”

“What I always want,” said Harry, still smiling, absently adjusting his wire-framed glasses. “I want what’s best for the family. Which these days means my being in charge of things, and not Eddie. The family needs my calm, considered decisions, not Eddie’s mad impulsiveness. He’ll screw it all up, get us all killed. You must know that, Molly; you know him better than any of us. Can you really trust him to do the right thing, under pressure? And if we go down… who’s going to be left to save the world?”

“What do you want, Harry?” said Molly.

“You are our only means of getting to Eddie,” said Roger. “If we could win you over to our cause, that is, Harry’s reclaiming of the family leadership; we feel there’s a very good chance Eddie would just fall apart without you.”

Molly smiled suddenly. “You really don’t know Eddie at all. He’s always been stronger than people think. He’s had to be. He doesn’t rely on me. He doesn’t need me. And he’ll carry on just fine when I’m gone.”

Harry and Roger glanced quickly at each other. “Are you… pla

“Don’t say you’ve finally had enough of Eddie’s goody-goody ways,” said Roger. “Well, it’s about time. You and I were close once, but I never did understand what you saw in him.”

“You and I were never that close,” said Molly.

“How can you say that?” said Roger, pouting playfully. “I took it ever so badly when you walked out on me. Took me weeks to get over you.”

“I walked out on you because you tried to sacrifice my soul to Hell!”

“Details, details. We all have our little family obligations.”

Molly sniffed. “So, you’re with Harry now. Bit of a surprise; you were always such a major tit man. Am I to take it you’re gay now?”

Roger shrugged. “I’m half demon. I don’t accept any human limitations, least of all in my sexuality. I want to try it all… and mostly I do.”

Molly looked at Harry. “And you’re not in the least jealous of what Roger and I used to have?”

“All you ever had in common was a bed,” said Harry. “Roger and I are in love.”

“Love?” Molly said incredulously. “He’s a hellspawn! A thing of the Pit, dedicated to dragging all humanity down into eternal damnation!”

“Criticism?” said Roger. “From the infamous Molly Metcalf? The woman who once lay down with demons in the Courts of Hell, to buy power she couldn’t acquire any other way? Does Eddie know about that? Have you told him all the things you used to do, oh wild and wicked witch of the woods? Do you really think he’d feel the same way about you if he did know?”

Molly met his gaze squarely, chin slightly lifted. “I was a different person, then. I had sworn vendetta against the Droods for the murder of my parents. I needed all the power I could get, to take them on. But… that was then, and this is now, time changes all things… pick whichever cliché you prefer. I’m not at all the person I used to be.”

“You think Eddie will care about that?” said Roger. “I think you’ll find he’s still very traditional, very old-fashioned, about certain things.”

“He doesn’t have to know what we know about you,” said Harry. “We don’t have to tell him. Not if you could find it in your heart to help us out, just a little.”

“In return for your guaranteed silence?” said Molly.

“Exactly,” said Roger. “All we ask is that you speak on our behalf. Support our position. Help persuade Eddie that it is in everyone’s best interests for him to step down and allow Harry to replace him as family leader. No big speeches, no big deal. Just a word in his ear, at the right moments.”

And then he broke off, because Molly was smiling at him, and it really wasn’t a very nice smile. Molly took a step forward, and Roger fell back a pace. Harry moved quickly to put himself between the two of them.

“Once,” said Molly, “it might have mattered to me, what you might say to Eddie. But things have changed. Tell him anything. I don’t care, and I don’t believe he will, either. Neither of us are concerned with the past anymore, only the future. But even so, Harry, Roger, I’d be very careful about doing anything that Eddie might perceive as a threat to me. He’s become very protective of me, the sweetie. And you really don’t want him to kick your arse in front of everyone again, do you, Harry?”

“We’re going to war!” said Harry. “The family needs me as leader!”

“No,” said Molly. “You had your chance, and you blew it. You let things get this bad. If I were Eddie, I’d kill you for what you’ve done to the family. And you know what? I might just kill you both anyway. On general principles. I could use something to cheer me up.”

She smiled brightly at Harry and Roger, and then turned and walked away. They watched her go.

“Women,” said Roger, and Harry nodded.

I closed down the lakeside scene, but I wasn’t finished with the Merlin Glass just yet. Part of me wanted to go and find Molly, and hold her to me, and tell her… nothing mattered. Nothing mattered to me, except her. But I still had responsibilities to the family, and there were things I needed to know. So I told the Glass to show me where Mr. Stab was, and what he was doing, right now. I should have remembered that not only do eavesdroppers rarely hear good of themselves, they also rarely hear anything good about anyone else.

To my surprise, the Merlin Glass showed me Mr. Stab sitting at his ease among the towering book stacks of the old library, while the under-librarian Rafe served him tea. Mr. Stab had changed out of the casual suit he’d been wearing the last time I saw him. Presumably because it was still soaked with Pe

“You’re not drinking your tea, Rafe,” said Mr. Stab.

“I’ll let it cool a bit first. You go right ahead.”

Mr. Stab looked at Rafe almost sadly, and then took a long drink from his cup. He made a slight moue of civilised distaste and put the cup down on a bookshelf beside him.

“If you’re going to work with poison, Rafe, you need to make the tea a lot stronger, to disguise the taste. And you put enough strychnine in that cup to see off a dozen normal men. But I haven’t been that easy to kill for a long time now. Poison is as mother’s milk to such as I. Why, Rafe? Is it Pe

Rafe stood up abruptly, throwing his cup aside. He stood towering over Mr. Stab for a long moment, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. Mr. Stab rose easily to his feet to face him. Rafe couldn’t get the words out at first, he was breathing so hard. His face was twisted with hatred and loathing.

“We were never close,” Rafe said hoarsely. “But we might have been. She never knew I cared about her. And now, thanks to you, she never will. Damn your soul to Hell.”

“Already done,” said Mr. Stab.

Rafe attacked him, throwing himself at the calm and unmoving immortal. He beat at Mr. Stab with his fists, while hot tears ran down his face, and Mr. Stab just stood there and took it. Rafe armoured up, and his golden fists hammered at Mr. Stab’s impassive face. The armoured strength behind the blows must have been hideous, but Mr. Stab took no obvious damage from them. And if he felt any pain, he didn’t show it. In the end, Rafe stood before Mr. Stab with his arms hanging heavily, armoured down, his face wet with sweat and tears. Mr. Stab looked at him.

“Cry, boy,” he said. “It’s all right. I would too, if I could.”

William Drood came along then, to see what all the noise was about, and took in the scene in a moment. He looked fiercely at Mr. Stab, who immediately stepped back, and William came forward and took Rafe away. Mr. Stab stood very still, not even looking around him, until William returned on his own. I watched Mr. Stab’s face all the time. It never changed once. I had no idea at all what he was thinking, or feeling. If he felt anything at all. There were times… when I wished I could be like that, and not have to feel all the things that hurt me so. William gestured for Mr. Stab to sit down, and he did so. William sat opposite him. He looked sadly at the discarded tea things.