As he looked into her eyes, he saw the despair that had consumed her for so long shrivel to nothing, and behind it rose a bright consuming light. In her smile there was everything he had ever wanted.
Church took her in his arms and she came to him easily. The weakness they had both felt fell away and a new strength was forged.
‘There was a song I kept playing, one they tried to take away from me,’ she whispered in his ear, ‘and I wondered why it meant so much to me. It was called “Save Me”, and that’s what you’ve done. You’ve brought me back from the land of the dead.’
They kissed, not like strangers, and suddenly everything became possible.
10
Once they were beyond the brooding confines of the Forest of the Night, they made camp amongst the ivy-covered ruins of a crumbling watchtower. Church was still shaky and finding it difficult to differentiate between the reality of his experiences in the casket and the wider reality he was now in. From what the others had told him, he had clearly observed the scene in Ruth’s flat, but how much of the rest could he count on? His description of the Caretaker gelled with what Ruth told him of her own experiences, but if he had shifted the Axis of Existence, what effect would it have? Had he achieved what he had hoped?
Despite his disorientation, he could barely believe he was back. Jubilation came slowly, in small increments that left him smiling for no reason that the others could tell. It had been a long journey from the Iron Age back to his own time, and it had changed him in ways he was still trying to comprehend. He had looked into the darkest part of himself and still found a light that would lead him on. He had found deep, innate reserves that existed beyond the Pendragon Spirit, and now he felt able to cope with what lay ahead. Hal had been right. The journey itself had been all the training he needed.
But it had not just been about what was inside him. He had received an education on humanity, that throughout history people were essentially the same, struggling against hardship, finding depths that helped them transcend their origins. Good people were everywhere, doing the best they could – Will Swyfte, Gabe and Marcy, in Carn Euny, Eboracum and London. Against the constantly clustering darkness of the universe, he found that fact eminently reassuring.
As the day drew on, they talked through everything they had faced and saw how their differing perspectives came together to create a fuller picture of events. Their conversations were tentative at first, but gradually they got to know each other, and Church felt they had begun to tap into the real depth of their friendship that had been denied them by the Void.
‘So let me get this straight,’ Laura said as she threw wood onto the campfire Shavi had built when twilight started to draw on. ‘It’s the four of us against God. Or the god that created our world, at least.’
‘That’s about the size of it,’ Church said.
‘And it controls an army of ten billion supernatural spiders.’
‘Unless the number is meant metaphorically. Could be more,’ Church said.
‘And this god controls an unspecified number of lesser gods, any one of which could probably bring the world to its knees.’
‘Yep.’
‘I think you’re going to need a bigger sword.’
‘It sounds like a suicide mission to me,’ Ruth noted.
‘Ah, don’t let that get in the way of your thinking,’ Laura said. ‘Life’s a suicide mission. It’s not a case of if, it’s when.’
They all thought about this and then laughed. Though he wouldn’t have said it to their faces, Church was proud of them; everything he had heard suggested they would be fine additions to the long heritage of the Brothers and Sisters of Dragons. Ruth was right – it was a suicide mission. Yet that didn’t bother them in the way it would have troubled other people, a fact that was both absurd and uplifting.
‘So how do we conduct a fight like that?’ Shavi mused thoughtfully.
‘I’ve been thinking about that. Laura was right in a way – we do need a bigger weapon,’ Church said.
‘If you only knew how many times in my life I’ve had to say that,’ Laura said.
‘What kind of weapon?’ Ruth edged closer to him.
‘The Extinction Shears,’ he said. ‘I saw what they could do. I think if we had them we could inflict some serious damage on the Void. Maybe even destroy it for good.’
‘You want to kill god,’ Laura said. ‘Nobody’s going to accuse you of aiming low.’
‘Then we need to find that market you mentioned—’ Shavi began.
‘The Market of Wishful Spirit,’ Church said. ‘It travels around, from place to place. You never know where it’s going to be until you stumble across it. The trader implied that the Shears were going to be off the market for a while, but we’re not going to let a little thing like that stop us, are we?’