Part 12 (2/2)

As for the Doctor, he just looks, his usually animated face stern and unmoving. He is perhaps the only still object within this palace, a centre, a void.

He watches Neville's rapture with but one thought in his mind. What have I done? What have I done?

Deep down beneath the skin of Ashkellia, a great spin is beginning. Particles, invisible microscopic particles, are charging up ready for their planet-spanning marathon.

Machinery a million years old and more prepares itself to begin work again, after all this time.

Inside the pyramid, the tomb of Valdemar comes to life.

The great gateway to the tomb, huge as a tower block, lights up. Bolts and locks slide into place. A pattern appears, apparently growing from the metal. The image is that of a five-pointed star.

The door shakes. It rattles, and blows of indescribable force hammer into it. Something is pounding, a force that has lain dormant for a million years. Dormant no longer.

Chapter Seven.

At last, the changing ceases. The palace seems brighter, more focused than before. All feel the difference, as if they had just awakened from a strange, elusive dream.

The Doctor sits and waits for Neville to go back on his word.

Once the theurgist has got over his excitement, he calls for Kampp. The unimpressed, impa.s.sive butler takes the Doctor by the arm.

'You wanted to see Pelham, Doctor,' says Neville. 'Off you go.'

The Doctor nods. 'And Romana? I don't suppose you're going to let her go, either?'

Neville scratches his beard, eager for this to be over. 'She has her uses. It seems my young ward, Huvan, has taken rather a liking to her.'

'This way, please,' says Kampp silkily, pulling the Doctor's arm just a little too firmly.

'Look, I've got work to do,' says Ponch, 'and I think I've guessed what this is all about. Is there a Valdemar there or not? Why don't you just tell me?'

The woman scowls. 'You can't stop me mid-flow. You're destroying all the c.u.mulative tension. I get enough stick as it is. If it's not my plots that are too complicated, it's my characters. Now they'll have an excuse to attack my style as well. Trying to be clever but no content, that's what they'll say. h.e.l.l, we live in a G.o.dless age. Can't you give a girl a chance?'

'Girl?'

'Shut up.'

Footsteps in the snow behind them. Ponch whirls around, ready for an attack. It is Ofrin. He yells. 'You gonna help me with these hides or do I have to knock your brains out?'

Particles of ice crystallise in his great beard.

'All right, all right, I'm coming.'

Ofrin blinks and spots Pelham. 'You? Where did you get to... last night?'

'Good morning.' She turns, obviously in some great arthritic pain. Ponch is surprised to notice she has turned paler since they sat down.

'Great ending by the way,' Ofrin says softly to the woman.

'Lots of fighting and that's what we all want, innit? Ponch!' he bellows again.

'All right, all right, I'm coming. So, the ending's about fighting?'

'Perhaps.' The woman looks at the snow. 'Perhaps it changes depending on who hears it.'

'Eh?'

'I think you should stay for the end. I don't think I've got long left. If I don't tell it now, I may never tell it again.'

'Ponch, don't you dare.'

Ponch turns to the bearded giant. He has never stood up to Ofrin in his life. 'I'll be there soon. I've got to hear this.'

Ofrin starts to growl. Ponch has already said enough to get himself killed. He will have to fight.

'Leave us, Ofrin. Ponch will be along shortly.' The woman is staring at the giant, kindly but unblinkingly.

'But I... the work...' Ofrin stutters.

'This is is work.' work.'

As Ponch watches, he sees Ofrin flap at his own face as if bothered by a snow-fly. The big man's eyes, almost hidden in his hair, screw up as if grappling with some insoluble problem. 'It won't take too long,' says Pelham.

Ofrin nods. As if he has forgotten something, he turns and clomps back to the growing settlement, muttering angrily.

Ponch is impressed.

'Right,' says Pelham, settling on to the tundra bank again.

'No more interruptions.'

'I'm sorry, Doctor. Mind you, you've only got yourself to blame.'

He looks around at his new surroundings, new but so, so familiar. The bare metal room, the locked door. Only the padded, restraining chairs separate this from the hundreds of other cells he has been locked into. And Miranda Pelham, tired and bruised, strapped next to him.

'I thought something was up,' she says, 'despite my rather limited view of the world at the moment. What happened?

How did you get the power back on?'

The Doctor is not listening; he is thinking through all the possible permutations of escape.

'Doctor?' she insists, breaking his concentration.

'Do you have to ask so many questions? You're worse than Romana.'

<script>