Part 24 (1/2)

As she realises that she is still in Huvan's chamber, despite the centuries, something heavy and lifeless falls on to her.

Kampp's corpse, his body stilled by bullets riveted into him.

A black film blurs Romana's vision.

'They have been touched,' comes a voice she remembers from the distant past. When she was... Neville, his name is Neville. 'Bring them.'

Part of her mind that she recognises as her own self-will forces her to resist this new consciousness. She needs a pathway, a track back to herself. Think, think back. The basic tenets, the Seven Strictures of Ra.s.sillon. Repeat them.

Repeat them! One at a time, over and over again. The Seven Strictures...

The immensity narrows and she can see herself, from above, the corpse of Kampp being lifted from her littleness.

With a swoop, she is back into her own small, separate self.

The Seven Strictures bounce around the box of her mind.

She feels the warm, scented air of the palace fill her lungs.

A guard, white-faced beneath his visor, pulls her to her feet. She pushes him away, trying to regain her composure.

'Thank you,' she says in her old voice. 'I can manage.'

Neville is bent over the supine Huvan, examining his eyes.

Romana sees how old he has become, and also the black shadows in his face. This force, this unleashed power has touched him too. She wonders if he can see that.

As she watches, trying to regain her focus, Neville lifts the boy's eyelids. 'Valdemar is in him. He has been washed clean, ready for the possession. Praise to the Dark One.'

'Praise to the Dark One,' respond the handful of guards stationed in the room. They lower their eyes.

'Bear him with us,' says Neville, reverently. 'Gently.'

He turns and Romana sees that he has been touched by more than Valdemar. His eyes s.h.i.+ne with madness. 'And you, his consort. It has been written.'

Despite the shock, despite what feels like near absorption into the stuff of the universe itself, Romana feels she is gaining in strength. 'Neville,' she says, steadier. 'You must end this. I'm very grateful to you, I think you saved more than my life and I wish to return the favour. Leave this place.

There is nothing here for you.'

'Really?'

Romana thinks about her call it 'communion', for want of a better word. 'I know the history of this palace, this planet.

The Old Ones were mistaken. They thought they could improve themselves by opening the higher dimensions.

Instead, the higher dimensions swamped them, overwhelmed their race. They, and you, were never meant to perceive the universe in its totality.'

Neville turns, ignoring her. With a crooked finger he indicates the guards are to bring her. They clasp her arms.

This is ridiculous, she thinks. What has got into him?

'Valdemar isn't a G.o.d,' she cries. 'It's an experiment that went horribly wrong.'

No good. He just doesn't want to listen. She struggles as the guards haul her out of the room. 'Neville! If you don't want to listen to me, listen to the Doctor. He is infuriatingly right, you know.'

At last, as she is dragged out into the corridor, he turns and looks up. Perhaps he imagines a halo over his own head.

'My dear,' he sneers. 'Bride of the Chosen One. Fear not for the Doctor. The enemies of Valdemar attend a fool's errand, for He cannot be fought.'

Through the verbiage, the messianic rubbish, Romana understands. She feels weak and her throat dries. He hasn't... he can't have...

'The Doctor has gone, into the clouds of this blasted planet.

Gone, so the Magus might live!'

Oh yea...

Listen to the words of the Magus! He is calm now as he waits in his place above, looking down on his vessel, no longer the human Neville but The Red Right Hand of Valdemar. The Becoming is nigh! Hail to the Magus!

The final act draws near, the Dark One stirs. The Magus is His rod and His staff.

He bears the body of the Chosen One, and bride, to the tomb.

The road is long and fraught with danger. The Magus may see this and understand this is how it must be, for his foes lay many traps and tricks to hold His glory within.

The mighty Valdemar has foreseen this and given human Neville the power to overcome.

Bear the bridal couple gently through the thoroughfares of His mighty palace! Bear them gently. The acolytes line the route to the metal craft that will lower them to the place of opening. Past the bodies of the fallen, the sacrificed, with their trickling streams and perfumed garden. Onwards! On!

To the airlock where the Doctor was banished.

The sacrifice of the Doctor was the final act, the blood quota that brought the Magus into full Becoming. Pelham was a nothing, a p.a.w.n in the game, but human Neville realised in the end that the Doctor was the final test, the last temptation.

At the head of the procession, the Magus turns, arms raised. He stares back at the line of guards, his disciples, and the offerings they bear. Huvan and Romana.

However, there are more. The Magus seems to see more, following in their wake. Black-shrouded disciples, thousands of them from thousands of planets. A mult.i.tude of faith that terminates with him, all focused on his glory. Their numbers reveal a diversity of races, odd faces and limbs, spectral and pale, all paying tribute to him, the one who released the Dark One.

'Your suffering is almost over, my brethren!' the Magus shrieks, fired with the Word of Valdemar. 'All your work, your belief is imminently to find its reward, in me!'

The guards look around, the confusion on their faces no doubt due to the sudden realisation of the horde behind them. Even the palace walls have disappeared and the Magus sees he stands on a mount, a green, gra.s.sy mount in the open air, swarming with apostles of the cult. He roars.

Something is stirring deep inside Huvan. His last real memory is of Romana coming back to him, shutting herself in with him. Then there was nothing but a black tide and visions so shocking and obscene it would be wrong for me to detail them here.

I must tell the rest of this story quickly, Ponch, for I do not have much time left. I know it is galling that I am interrupted at this late stage, after you have been listening so carefully, so precisely. I was hoping to get to the end without further interruption, but even stories do not always travel along the paths you would wish them to. It may be months before you understand, before you realise the significance of this that I am telling you.

I tell it not because I think there is anything to learn, I tell it because I am old.

Take me back to the inn; I have my reasons. You must help me to my feet; I cannot walk in this snow.

Ah, age is a new life. When a woman is old, she feels that her body, her sh.e.l.l, is a different companion to the one she knew before. No longer a faithful pet, obedient to her every order, no matter how stupid or self-destructive. The body becomes demanding, selfish, unwilling to do as it is told. One day you wake up and you realise you are the slave, not the mistress. And later, you realise that, in fact, it was always like this.