Contents
Cover
About the Book
About the Author
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Acknowledgements
Copyright
To Matthew and Verity
Varuz is lost now. Even the name has gone. The maps have been overwritten; the books burned or locked away in some forgotten library; the children taught different stories in a different tongue. Perhaps high up in the mountains some old goatherd remains, muttering away, his accent thick and impenetrable, with only his charges and the silent peaks to hear him.
We spoke the old language, of course, my wife and I, but only when we were alone together. We told the old tales and sang the old songs, and we took some comfort from them. When the world that you have loved is lost, you hold whatever fragments remain to you, and they are more precious and dear to you than all the riches of the new world. We grieved our loss, and we remembered our past, but in all our long years together, we never spoke of returning. Why would we? In the early days, a return would have brought Conrad’s men down upon us and, later, when the long years had made those old struggles meaningless, we knew that the land we had loved was gone for good. We consoled ourselves with the knowledge that it was only in leaving our home that we were able to become husband and wife. Time changes all things; all love ends in one way or another. Only memory remains.
Even my name is different now. To the woman who washes and cleans for me, I am the old man, to be fussed over and reprimanded. To the children who come every other day, I am Grandfather, to be teased and hugged, and have treats coaxed from me. And to those people who come to hear my counsel – the lost and the lonely, the man who can find no love, the woman who can find no rest – I am Father, the holy man, the man of wisdom, the man of peace. To my wife, I was beloved, but those days too are now behind me. And once upon a time, my name was Bernhardt – Lord Bernhardt of Varuz, the land between the mountains and the sea. The lost land. The land that has gone …
Once, they dreamt of glory. Once they dreamt that their names would go down in song and story, appear in lights, that they and their quest would never be forgotten …
They have been travelling for a long time now. When they first set out, they rode on horseback. Now they fly between the stars. Aeons have passed since they set out, and they have been travelling for so long now that they have forgotten their names and their histories. Over the years they have taken on new names and histories, again and again, and forgotten these in turn, again and again … Now they are too old to care about names, or histories. They are too old even to care for glory. All that matters is the quest, whatever that might mean. For they have forgotten even that. There is only the chase, the never-ending chase …
‘Are we lost?’ Clara peered down into the deep narrow valley. It was very beautiful, she had to admit, with the bright green grass and light dusting of mountain flowers. A touch Heidi. But it wasn’t the quasi-mediaeval city she had been promised. It was nothing like a city at all.
‘Lost?’ The Doctor waved the sonic screwdriver around in an apparently random fashion. ‘Of course we’re not lost. Lost is a state of mind. Lost is an attitude towards one’s circumstances—’
‘We are lost.’
‘Maybe a little.’
‘But all we really need is a change of attitude.’
‘That,’ said the Doctor, ‘would be a start.’
Clara smiled to herself. ‘There’s a path over there,’ she said. ‘Looks, um, muddy. But it’s definitely a path. Why don’t we bring some attitude to that?’
The Doctor shrugged. ‘As long as it’s going down.’
It was indeed going down, and precipitously, but they met the challenge with equanimity and, even, Clara thought, with attitude. When they were back on more level ground, the sun was beginning to set. ‘What would happen,’ Clara said, asking a question which had been troubling her ever since they had arrived on this world, ‘if the TARDIS fell off its perch?’ They’d materialised on a very steep slope. There had been some considerable manoeuvring to get out. ‘Would it break?’
‘Break?’ The Doctor stopped mid-step. ‘The TARDIS is a highly sophisticated machine. It’s practically alive. Do you think it would just let itself fall off a hill?’
Clara reached out a hand to stop the Doctor from taking a tumble himself. ‘In fairness, I think we can call this a mountain,’ said Clara. ‘And there’s a thing we call gravity.’
‘It wouldn’t do too much damage,’ said the Doctor, putting both feet firmly down again. ‘It never has in the past.’
‘Oh good,’ said Clara. ‘That’s encouraging. Next question – and you don’t know how I’ve longed to ask this ever since I took up teaching and got stuck with daytrip duty – are we there yet?’
‘Nearly.’
‘Nearly. I’ll hold you to that. I mean, I’m enjoying the quiet and everything – don’t get me wrong – you don’t ever really hear quiet, do you? There’s always music playing, or someone trying to talk to you, or else the hum of an ancient and precariously balanced time machine. So some silence is nice. But I’m nearly up to my limit. Nearly.’
The Doctor smiled and walked on. Clara followed. The path curved round the mountainside, and, reaching the other side, Clara stopped in her tracks and gasped.
There was a city in the valley – small but grand, with strong square buildings made of a fine yellow stone. A river ran through the city, crossed by – Clara counted – seven iron bridges. Beyond the city lay the sea, over which the sun was setting in a great red ball of flame, glittering orange on the sea and the river, and setting the stone of the city’s buildings ablaze.
‘Wow,’ said Clara.
‘Yes,’ said the Doctor.
They stood together, in silence, and watched the darkness gather. The sun slid down the sky, more quickly than one would have expected, until at last it slipped down below the horizon. And then, to Clara’s surprise, the city came alight again: bright pricks of yellow light coming from the buildings; strings of light like beads marking out the river.
‘Hang on a minute,’ said Clara, ‘That’s electric light! Doctor, I thought we were somewhere olde worlde. Should there be electric lights?’
‘Why not?’ said the Doctor. ‘History can be complicated.’
They admired the pretty cityscape for a while until, suddenly, half the city was plunged into darkness, as if a great blanket had fallen from the sky, smothering out the lights. ‘What was that?’ said Clara. ‘Power cut?’
‘Could be,’ the Doctor said. His sonic screwdriver was back out, Clara noticed.
She narrowed her eyes. ‘Is there something going on here, Doctor?’
‘Going on?’
‘I don’t really believe that you ever go anywhere by chance.’
He gave her a hurt look. ‘Now, Clara, that’s not entirely fair.’
‘No?’
‘I’ll admit the TARDIS has a knack of finding places experiencing … how shall we put it? A little local difficulty.’
‘Oh, and you love a little local difficulty, don’t you, Doctor?’
He gave a mirthless grin. ‘Well, it wouldn’t be polite to walk on by.’
‘Polite?’ Clara laughed, as they went on down the slope into the valley. ‘When did you get concerned with manners? Anyway, that’s not what I’m really interested in. How come there’s electric light down there and nothing proper?’
‘Proper?’ The Doctor snorted. ‘You mean cars, don’t you?’
‘Not necessarily,’ said Clara, although right now she would quite happily have called a local taxi firm to pick them up and take them into town. It was getting chilly.
‘You do mean cars,’ he said. ‘And digital watches.’
‘Cars I’ll grant you,’ said Clara, ‘but I really don’t mean digital watches.’
But the Doctor was already under way. ‘Some civilisations, Clara,’ he said, ‘understand that technology doesn’t have to be about conspicuous consumption. Some civilisations understand that technology is there for no better reason than to make life easier. Technology should serve its makers, not make them its servants. Technology isn’t something you have to have. It isn’t something to chase.’
‘I swear to you,’ Clara said, ‘that I have never, in my life, chased after a digital watch. I may once or twice have run for a bus—’
‘Some civilisations – naming no names – get obsessed with having the latest gadget, the latest app. But other civilisations have more sense. Their technology doesn’t control them in the same way. They make,’ he concluded, ‘only what they need.’
‘Really?’ Clara looked down at the city, where the dark quarter remained unlit. ‘I bet there’s something else they want. Something they’d chase, given the chance.’
In the vast empty reaches of space, there are many places where a person can hide, and many places where objects of great desire can be hidden. Distance and time can make everything disappear – that, and a little cunning. Some things can remain lost for ever, until all memory of them has gone.
But the universe is busy too, busy with curious people who like to find things out, and some people make it their quest to discover what is lost. The traveller aboard this particular ship was exactly that kind of person. He was a collector – a finder of things. He was not a fortune hunter – no, he did not like being described that way; he was not interested in wealth, he said. He was interested in knowledge. What he hated most of all was a hole – a gap in his knowledge. What he hated most of all was that something might exist beyond his ability to see it, to touch it, and to learn from it. He had the best of motives or, at least, his motives were not harmful, which sometimes is as good as it gets.
He has been travelling for a long time, this traveller-collector, and he has visited many different worlds and cultures. While these are not his particular area of interest he has, by necessity, become good at making first contact in a way that does not alarm the locals. When his lead brings him to a new world, he does not hurry down. He takes his time to do his research. He makes sure about the basics, of course – whether he can breathe the air and drink the water (if either of these things exist). He checks for life signs. He checks for intelligent life signs. He checks whether their intelligence has been perverted into belligerence. And, most of all, he tries to find out what these intelligences can do: what they make, what they build, what they craft. He checks for communications technologies. If they are advanced enough, he watches their news and their sports and their entertainments. He may take a little peek into their private communications. (He has blushed, sometimes, at this stage.)
The world he has come to now interests him. There are communications, but they are few and far between, and very irregular. A civilisation on the verge of technological explosion? He studies a little more, and finds the traces of ancient messages in the ether, and comes to a different conclusion. This is a world that was busier, once upon a time, but has now become quiet. That makes his life a little trickier, since now he must find different ways to learn about their culture, but his resources are good, and he is a committed researcher. He is on the trail of something special, something remarkable, and he is working very hard to achieve the object of his desire.
And when he is satisfied that he has done all that he can, his small ship slips quietly down from orbit to land upon a world unfamiliar to the traveller, but which is known now to us. The traveller has followed a trail, and extrapolated a destination, and this leads him to land somewhere between the mountains and the sea …
By the time Clara and the Doctor reached the city it was fully dark, but the road leading towards the gates was lined with great lampposts, ornate and beautifully wrought, and the light from these was enough to make the journey clear. Still, every third or fourth one was not working, and, close up, Clara could see that the iron of the lampposts was flaking away. She saw that the city walls, when she looked closely, were crumbling too, with much loose mortar and worn stone. The gates stood open and were unguarded, and they passed into a great court, cobbled underfoot, and busy with townspeople. Some of these stopped to look at them.
‘Aren’t city gates usually locked after dark?’ said Clara.
‘Only if the residents are expecting enemies any moment,’ said the Doctor. ‘Do we look like enemies?’
‘I think we must look like something,’ Clara said, as more and more of the townspeople turned to look at them, nudging each other, whispering, sending the news on ahead. ‘They probably think we’ve come to nick the Crown Jewels or something.’
‘I have a feeling the Crown Jewels have been sold off some time ago,’ muttered the Doctor, running his hand along the old bricks of a wall.
They walked on across the courtyard, a small crowd following them at a slight distance, buzzing with gossip. A narrow street opened before them. ‘Up here?’ said Clara.
‘Why not?’ said the Doctor.
He led the way, but they did not get very far. The breadth of the street was blocked by a group of six soldiers, smartly if garishly uniformed, and heading their way.
‘Well,’ said the Doctor, ‘news of our arrival has certainly been passed upstairs quickly. What does that tell us, Clara?’
‘That … electric lights might not be the only gizmos they have around here?’
‘Spot on. So –’ the Doctor turned to face the soldiers and smiled – ‘let’s find out what I’m supposed to have done now.’
The leader of the group stepped forwards. He was a young man wearing a grand uniform covered in brass buttons and various other pieces of paraphernalia, none of which seemed to be making him feel particularly comfortable. ‘In the name of the Most Noble Aurelian, Duke of Varuz, I welcome you to our city.’
‘A welcome,’ said Clara. ‘That’s good, isn’t it? Doctor, isn’t that good?’
‘Certainly makes for a pleasant change,’ the Doctor said, considerably more cautiously. He moved closer to the young man, and tapped one of the brass buttons. ‘Do these do anything?’
‘I don’t think they do anything, Doctor,’ Clara said. ‘I think they’re decoration.’
‘Decoration?’ The Doctor peered at the button more closely. ‘Why? What for?’ He tugged at the button which, mercifully, remained in place. Had Clara been in the officer’s place, she might have lost her patience, but the young man was staring at the Doctor keenly, almost earnestly. Clara found herself rather taken by him.
‘Hope against hope,’ the young man said, softly. ‘Could this be the change we have been waiting for? Could this be the moment when the tide turns?’
His ruminations got no further. Another of the guard, an older man, grey-haired and with slightly less in the way of decoration, stepped forwards. ‘Enough of a delay, eh, my lord? His highness is waiting to receive our visitors.’
The young man stiffened, as if caught out in an indiscretion. ‘We’re hardly delaying—’
‘You know how your uncle doesn’t like to be kept waiting.’
The young man flushed scarlet. He turned on his heel and called out to the rest of the company to follow. The older man, smiling, gestured to the Doctor and Clara to follow, and took up position behind them.
‘Phew,’ said Clara, under her breath. ‘How not to win over your boss …’
They passed on further into the city, through streets made narrow by the high square buildings and made only slightly less shadowy under the intermittent glare of lamp-light. They crossed three of the bridges, the river black and slow-moving beneath and, after a good fifteen minutes’ walk, came at last to a sturdy palace. Its walls, high and solid, gave it the guarded air of a citadel, although the arched windows and gold and blue mosaics above the great doors made clear that display was at least as important as defence, or had been once upon a time. Now the stonework was as chipped and worn as it was throughout the rest of the city, and the colours of the mosaics had almost faded away.
The great palace doors were guarded by four men in heavy armour. The young officer went ahead to speak to them and Clara, thinking over the young man’s words, said suddenly, ‘Doctor, have you been here before and forgotten to mention it?’
‘What?’ The Doctor, who had been playing with some kind of device or other, palming it around in his hand, stopped and put the thing away. ‘Not that I remember. Why?’
Clara nodded to the young man, now in quiet conversation with the palace guards. ‘I thought that maybe he had recognised you.’
The Doctor shrugged. ‘I suppose I might come here next.’
Clara sighed. ‘What does that even mean?’
‘It’s perfectly straightforward—’
‘It’s all right. Really. I get it.’ She nodded at the guards. ‘Look, they’ve got swords. That’s not very high-tech.’
‘Look again, Clara,’ the Doctor said softly.
She peered at them. ‘I am looking again. Long thin things, presumably pointy and sharp inside those jackets.’
‘Those “jackets” are actually “scabbards”.’
‘Mm, I think I prefer “jackets”. Keeps them cosy. What am I missing?’
‘Plenty, I should think.’ The Doctor smiled. ‘But those swords? They aren’t metal, for one thing.’
‘No?’ Clara stared at them more closely. Long, thin, pointy …
‘No,’ said the Doctor. ‘I think they’re lasers.’
‘Really? Like light sabres?’ Clara was impressed. ‘That could actually be quite brilliant.’
‘Not if you’re on the receiving end. We’ll try not to test them, yes?’
‘You’re the boss.’
The young man, finishing his conversation with the guards, gestured to them to follow. As they walked towards the palace doors, the guards fell back, saluting them as they passed through.
Clara said, ‘You’re quite sure you haven’t been here?’
‘Yes!’
‘It’s just everyone seems to be showing you a great deal of respect …’ Clara laughed. ‘Oh, hang on, now I do believe you haven’t been here before.’
Inside, the building had the same air of faded glamour; the great arched windows had cracks and chips in the small panes of glass; many of the tiles underfoot were broken; and the gold worked into the walls was peeling away or completely gone. They came to another guarded doorway, and the young lord went ahead to speak to the guards. The older officer followed him, much to the young man’s clear irritation.
‘Is it me,’ said Clara, ‘or does everything look like it’s falling down? I don’t mean in a Michael Douglas way—’
Suddenly, the young man lost his temper. He banged the flat of his hand against the wall.
‘Or perhaps I do,’ said Clara thoughtfully. The older officer came back towards them, but Clara watched as the young man got himself under control. When the older man reached them again, Clara said, ‘Your boss doesn’t seem happy.’
The soldier smiled. ‘The young lord? Oh, Lord Mikhail’s not happy about anything.’
‘Probably doesn’t like you muscling in all the time.’
‘Clara,’ said the Doctor, ‘let’s leave this for the moment.’ He turned to the officer. ‘I assume you’re taking us to the Duke?’
‘Where else? You’re expected. Have been for some time.’
The young man, now fully under control again – in fact, if anything, a little too stiff, led them through the doors into the hall.
‘“Expected for some time?”’ Clara frowned. ‘Doctor, you’re absolutely sure this place is new to you and you’re new to them?’
The Doctor looked uncomfortable. ‘I think so … There’ve been a lot of places.’
Clara sighed. ‘I bet you my digital watch we’ll be seeing the inside of the dungeons within the hour.’
As they passed into the hall, they were announced. ‘The ambassador and his servant!’
‘“Ambassador”?’ said Clara. ‘Give me a break!’
But the Doctor had the trump card. He burst out laughing. ‘“Servant”?’
For months at a time they can exist in silence, doing no more than what is necessary to keep them going. To keep them searching, searching … for something they can barely remember. They have forgotten what. They have forgotten why. There is only a single word …
And then, suddenly, the instrumentation springs into life. Lights flash. Alarms sound. A sighting! A reading! A trace! A tiny chance that here, in this new place that they have never visited before, they will find some answers. They will discover the object of their quest …
The universe is vast, and holds many secrets. They could search for ever, and they will. But today, they have come to this particular world, and on that world they have a particular destination. They are coming to the land that lies between the mountains and the sea …
I have thought many times, over the years, of writing down what happened in those last days. At first, I would not have dared – it would have given us away, if found, but, later, I always came back to the same difficulty: who would read such a history? Who would care to read about the end of a lost and unlamented land, written in a lost unspoken tongue?
I am old. There is nobody in this world to whom I could speak who would understand. Conrad is long dead; the young lord is gone. I am the last, unless those strange wanderers who passed through Varuz in those last days remember something of us yet. But when I think of them, and reflect upon them, it seems to me that they were cloaked in a kind of deliberate forgetfulness, as if their pasts were not to be admitted, keeping them mindful of nothing more than the present … Do they remember? No, I am not convinced that they remember. I am not convinced that they remember us at all, or, if they do, we are only part of a succession of adventures and rapidly passing events, that merge like ripples on a stream. Only I remain constant, it seems, with my memories, which are now fading. The days pass, and I feel my strength slipping away from me. And I find that I must write down what happened – for myself, so that I can leave this world knowing that some record survives me of those days. Perhaps one day, somebody will find it. Perhaps the secrets of an unknown script will intrigue them, and they will seek to decipher what I have written. Perhaps my story will move them. Perhaps, for the brief time that they give me their attention, Varuz will live again, as it was once; or as it could have been. As my memory has made it.
I take heart from this. So I will write down all that happened, in those strange last days that followed after the holy man came to Varuz …
The hall into which they had been brought was high-ceilinged and many-pillared, and, at the far end, was a slightly raised dais upon which two plain black seats had been placed. A man sat on one of these, and a woman on the other. Both of them were richly dressed. Slightly to one side, and a step or two down from them, was another man, dressed all in black. The young officer, Lord Mikhail, gestured to Clara and the Doctor to follow him down the hall towards the trio.
Their footsteps echoed on the stone flags, and Clara was very conscious of the eyes of the three people upon them. ‘Nice digs,’ she said to Mikhail.
‘The Great Hall,’ the Doctor said, grandly.
‘You’re still absolutely sure that you’ve not been here before?’
‘Well, what else is it going to be called?’ said the Doctor. ‘It’s never the Mediocre Hall or the In Urgent Need of Renovation Hall. It’s always the Great Hall. Although looking round this one …’
‘A lick of paint wouldn’t do any harm,’ Clara agreed.
When they reached the dais, Mikhail bowed and said, ‘My lord Duke; my lady Duchess. Your guests.’
Clara glanced between Mikhail and the woman. Up close, the similarity between him and the woman was clear: his dark hair was military-short and hers was long and held in place beneath a jewelled cap, but both had golden tints that glinted in the light. His long fingers were curled around the hilt of his sword; hers, ring-encrusted, sat twined upon her lap. They were obviously related – but how? Clara wasn’t exactly getting parental vibes.
Mikhail, turning to the Duke, said, ‘My lord—’
But the Duke lifted his hand to stop the young man from speaking. ‘We thank you for your service in bringing our guests, Lord Mikhail,’ he said. ‘You may leave us now.’
The young man hesitated. He clearly wanted to be present throughout the following encounter, and he glanced over at the Duchess, as if looking for support. Almost imperceptibly, she shook her head. The scarlet flush passed over Mikhail’s face again, but he bowed, turned, and left.
‘Families, huh?’ said Clara, to nobody in particular.
The Duke, frostily, replied, ‘Lord Mikhail has a strong will. A flaw in many young men.’
‘It’s not really any of my business,’ Clara said. ‘But he seems to mean well.’
The Duke, however, had turned his attention to the Doctor. ‘I am Aurelian,’ he said, ‘Duke of the Most Ancient, Serene, and Noble State of Varuz.’ He reached out to rest his left hand upon the arm of the woman next to him. ‘My wife, the Duchess Guena.’ He nodded to the man standing beside him. ‘And the Lord Bernhardt.’
In the silence that followed, Clara studied each them in turn. The Duke was fortyish, square and strong and obvious. His wife was about the same age, all the more beautiful for the small lines around her mouth and eyes, which were sharp and intelligent. Bernhardt was so undistinguished as to be practically part of the shadows. Clara was impressed. She imagined he must put a lot of effort into doing that.
The pause continued. ‘What are they waiting for?’ whispered Clara.
‘Search me,’ the Doctor whispered back, then, clearing his throat, he said, ‘Sorry, was I meant to be saying something at this point?’ He waved at them. ‘Hello yourselves!’ Then he frowned. ‘Was that meant to be more formal?’