Doctor Who_ Battlefield Part 22

And their forces could rebound on the wizards who sought to use them.

In her hands, Morgaine held the silver chains with which she would bind the darkest power of all.

And with that power she would destroy Merlin for ever.

A column of raw energy began to grow from the sphere within the octogrammaton.

'With this fire I shall summon thee.'

Before its radiance, all the shadows in the priory seemed to scuttle across the surfaces of the walls. Whispering like dead leaves, they gathered and sought refuge within the long shadow cast like a pall behind the Queen.

The shadow grew.

'With this silver I shall bind thee.'

The chains were gone from her hands.

Darkness slithered across the sky above the rafter beams. A cold wind blew against Morgaine's cloak and hair. She had opened the gate of h.e.l.l and a foul, chill draught issued forth.

Somewhere cruel hidden eyes were watching her, but the demon could not resist her summons.

She heard the great breathing and the thud of its cloven feet. She turned and saw her ma.s.sive shadow rearing up the wall. The silhouette had a life and shape of its own. It towered grotesquely above her, black as the pit of despair.

And on its great shadowy head, there cl.u.s.tered a crown of curling horns.

'What did the Doctor say?' said Shou Yuing. ' "At the first sign of something strange..."'

Everything in the past two days had been strange; so strange and so fast that she hadn't had time to draw breath and think. 'Strange' had suddenly become 'normal'; so how would she know?

Outside the deserted hotel, the daylight flickered. Above the empty bar, a hand-scrawled sign was pinned. Under Under New Management. New Management.

Ace pulled open an ammunition case and held up one of the silver bullets. 'Looks like Colonel Blimp has a fancy taste in hardware.'

'You don't like him much, do you?' said Shou Yuing.

Ace rested the bullet upright on the bar. 'I like being treated as a person. Not a "latest one". Anyway, I don't trust him to guard the Professor's back. That's my job.'

She flipped the Doctor's hat up her arm and on to her head the way she'd seen him do it. 'And if he really is Merlin. You know what that makes me, don't you?'

Shou Yuing giggled and shook her head.

Ace lifted Excalibur and held it out like a wand. 'The sorcerer's apprentice,' she cried.

Inside and outside, the light dimmed noticeably.

'Do you think that counts as strange?' said Shou Yuing.

Her voice had taken on a fresh tremor of fear.

Ace fumbled in her jacket pockets for the chalk.

They dragged the furniture to one side and pulled up the carpet. Behind the bar, Shou Yuing found a length of string. They attached it to the chalk.

It was getting too dark to see. The sky had turned to a threatening bronze that seemed to suck away the light.

Shou Yuing held one end of the string to the stone floor, while Ace circled her slowly with the chalk. It took three attempts to produce something approaching a perfect continuous circle.

Standing together in the centre, with the sword and scabbard between them, they watched the darkened room beyond the circle.

'Do you think we should sprinkle holy water or something?' said Ace.

'I don't know,' Shou Yuing said. 'I'm Chinese. It's not my mythology.'

Ace lit a candle she had found. She sorted through the dozen packets of crisps she had lifted from the bar as supplies. 'What flavour do you want?' she asked.

'But it's the middle of the afternoon, isn't it?'

Ace swallowed hard. 'It was the last time I looked.'

'Then why is it so dark?'

It was a bizarre sensation, decided the Brigadier. On the few occasions when he had driven Bessie, the car's superdrive facility had always been removed by the Doctor, forcing him to stay within the speed limit. Now, as the Doctor opened the superdrive up, the countryside became a blurr that flowed smoothly past with unreal velocity.

The speedometer indicated only thirty mph, which was ludicrous until the Brigadier realized that the needle was going round for the second time.

He glanced behind them and saw a sudden darkness growing like a thundercloud above the land towards Carbury. Ahead there was black smoke rising.

As they topped Bedivere's ridge, Bessie's wheels locked and she skidded to an abrupt halt. The Brigadier threw out a hand to steady himself, but the veteran roadster's drive system neatly absorbed all inertia. Its pa.s.sengers, one of whom expected to be hurled through the windscreen and halfway along the bonnet, were left safely ensconced in their seats.

The Doctor stood up and stared over the top of the windscreen.

'I think we're too late, Brigadier,' he said grimly. He climbed out of the car and gazed down the hill in fascination.

There was battle by the lake. Explosions and gunfire through the drifting smoke. He heard men shouting, screaming and dying.

The Doctor was already angry with himself. He had felt the strength of Morgaine's power and knew her forces would not be confined to human soldiers for long. Soon she would summon darker powers. The chalk he had give Ace might be the correct response to any attack that Morgaine unleashed, but it was also exactly what Merlin would have done.

Every way he turned, however much he tried to resist, the answer was always the same. He might as well have scrawled THE DOCTOR WAS HERE all over the walls of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. Ace could show him how.

He had been set up by the future. Merlin was behind all this and he, the Doctor, was destined to be Merlin. It was unavoidable. One day, barring accidents, he would travel into the past of another universe and trigger the events he had forced himself to endure now.

He took out the spare hat that he always kept in his pocket and planted it on his head. He felt no better.

Merlin had put Arthur into suspended animation for some reason; perhaps the High King himself would explain when he awoke. But he might not take kindly to being woken, only to find that this was not the hour of England's greatest need.

The Doctor looked at his watch... just in case.

At all costs, Morgaine must be prevented from reaching Arthur first, for she certainly meant him some harm.

There was enough damage being done already.

And her men must be prevented from laying hands on the nuclear missile. The Doctor trusted no one, not even himself, with such an infernal device. It was irresponsible in the extreme to leave it lying about like that. He was glad he had left Ace behind.

The UNIT vehicles had been pulled into a circle surrounding the missile launch vehicle. Morgaine's troops were subjecting them to a barrage of gunfire from all sides.

Further off, the Doctor could seem more men-at-arms emerging from the trees. The UNIT troops, for all their hi-tech weaponry, were vastly outnumbered.

To his surprise, he saw several figures breaking away from the cl.u.s.ter of vehicles. The man leading them had a ma.s.s of yellow hair and must be Ancelyn. Beside him was another figure in UNIT fatigues and wielding a sword. It was Winifred Bambera.

Men-at-arms, immune to the bullets, were running to meet them in hand-to-hand combat.

Fools, thought the Doctor, for neither of them was wearing armour. 'What good will any of it do?' he said aloud.

'I sometimes wonder myself.' said the Brigadier who was standing next to him.

The Doctor turned back to the car. 'Come on.'

'Doctor, I've just received the most peculiar message from the hotel.'

'What? Did it say anything about Ace and Shou Yuing?'

The Brigadier climbed into his seat. 'No. All they said was "Night has fallen here." '

The Doctor looked back towards the darkening sky. He thought for a second.

There was a fresh barrage of explosions from the battle.

They had started using grenades.

'I'll deal with the hotel later.' He started Bessie's engine.

'First I have to stop this bloodshed.'

'How, Doctor?' said the Brigadier. 'Stand in the middle and shout?'

The Doctor looked at him in surprise. 'Good idea,' he said.

Bambera searched for Ancelyn through the lighting. She saw him once from a distance, tackling two men-at-arms, but then she was set upon herself.

Her men were dying and she loathed it. She had followed Ancelyn out into the open, because he was the only one who understood their way of fighting and she had to learn it too.

She was trained in fencing, but a broadsword was another matter. Ancelyn said she was a born warrior. He told her to watch her footwork and let the force come after the blow. When they saw she had a sword, they lowered their guns. But even then they seemed reluctant to attack her. She suspected it wasn't honourable to take on a woman. But it was them or her, so it was them. So much for honour.

Killing and maiming with a gun was surgical in comparison. First it had been smoke. Now it was blood.

They both sickened her. The sword hilt bit into her bare hands. But she was desperate to find Ancelyn; and desperate for her soldiers to survive.

How did she stop it? Kill their leader? Capture their standard? The fighting had moved away from her and was concentrated on the convoy again. Through the explosions, she heard Ancelyn's voice shouting for Mordred to come and meet him.

Then the shouts stopped.

She stumbled over the top of a ridge and saw the enemies facing each other, ten metres between them.

'Mordred,' called Ancelyn. 'Face me, Mordred. Is your army not enough to give you courage?'

'Courage?' the Prince sneered. 'To face you, Ancelyn, who fled the field at Camlaan? Ancelyn the Craven, I call you.'

Bambera ran down the slope to Ancelyn's side. 'Forget about being n.o.ble, Ancelyn. Get under cover!'

Ancelyn grinned at her and stood his ground. 'What care I for the words of a half-man, who cowers from a woman's wrath.'

They raised their swords in fierce salute. Winifred stepped back as the two men, screaming all their hatred, charged towards each other.

From nowhere, another figure darted between them.

Flinging his arms wide, the Doctor yelled, 'Stop! I command it!'

Whether by a trick of his own or by some natural acoustic, his voice carried across the entire field of battle.

The fighting stopped. The smoke drifted and cleared. The armies turned to a man and stared as the figure mounted the ridge. He circled, addressing men-at-arms and UNIT troops alike. He did not shout, he simply said with quiet authority, 'There will be no battle here.'

The soldiers waited. They looked around them, bewildered at the dead and injured. They knew, as he had learned, that Merlin stood amongst them once again. A single voice cried out in pain and then was silent.

One sound alone disturbed the battlefield. Mordred was laughing.

'This is not a battle,' he said. 'It is but a ruse. A diversion.'

It was like a thunderclap. The Doctor slowly walked down the ridge towards the prince. 'No,' he said, but he knew that he was wrong.

Morgaine, whom he had never met, knew him of old.

She knew his mind and his weaknesses.