Live and Let Drood

begged it from the Heart for myself as part of the deal I made. Centuries later I returned to the Droods. Killed some small nonentity and took over his identity. The Immortals showed me how to do that.
    “And ever since I have always been there, hiding in plain sight in the background, doing my best to nudge and persuade the family back to what it should be. Just a quiet, influential voice advising and guiding those in positions of power. And removing those who got in my way. Those who wouldn’t listen. Nothing like a good accident to stir things up and move people around.”
    “You killed the Matriarch Sarah,” I said. “So my grandmother Martha could take over.”
    “So I did! Pushed her down a flight of stairs. And then stamped on the back of her neck when she didn’t have the decency to die straight away. I have always been well served by accidents.”
    “Why the hell did you bring the Loathly Ones into this world?” I said. “Did you know what you were doing?”
    “Of course. The Droods have always needed someone or something worthy to fight, to keep them sharp. To keep them the warriors I always meant them to be. I could see the War wasn’t going to last much longer, and I wanted to be sure there’d be a new villain in place afterwards. Who could have foreseen the Cold War? I was having such fun then, running endless agents and intrigues back and forth across the world…that I quite forgot about the Loathly Ones. The Droods really were getting soft by your time, Eddie. I never intended my family to be peace-loving shepherds.”
    “Why ally yourself with Crow Lee?” I said.
    “Because I’ve finally grown tired of the Droods,” said the Original Traitor. “Your wiping out the Immortals was the last straw. I always had more in common with them than my own family. I finally realised that the Droods were never going to be what I wanted them to be. And if I couldn’t have them, why should anyone else? But now I think I’ve answered enough of your questions, Eddie. It’s time for you to answer some of mine. Starting with: Where did you get your armour? I can tell it isn’t the strange-matter armour you got from Ethel, but it can’t be the old style, with the Heart destroyed. So where did it come from?”
    “I found it in the hedge Maze,” I said. “It’s Moxton’s Mistake.”
    Adrian Drood’s face actually went pale for a moment. “You fool…Do you know what you’ve done? I put that abomination in the Maze! Do you know what you’ve let loose on the world?”
    “A weapon,” I said. “To use against you.”
    And I reached into my pocket dimension and brought out the other little gift from Armourer Patrick: the skeleton key that could unlock anything. I jammed it right up against my torc, and the power in the key fought the power holding my armour inside my torc. The bone key turned slowly, relentlessly, in my grasp, and then snapped round in acomplete circle. And just like that, my armour came to me. It surged out of the torc, covering me in a moment, cutting me off from my pain and injuries and weakness, making me strong and secure again. I rose to my feet to confront Crow Lee and Adrian Drood, and they both fell back before me. Mr. Stab studied me thoughtfully from the window but made no move to intervene.
    “Now,” I said, to my enemies before me. “For all you’ve done. For all the pain you’ve caused me and so many others, now…it’s time for me to get my hands bloody.”
    “I have an answer to your armour,” Crow Lee said steadily. He held up his huge hand, and in it was the Hand of Glory made from a monkey’s paw. Bloodred flames rose steadily from the candlewick fingers. Crow Lee nodded, satisfied. “I never throw anything useful away, and I always know where everything is.”
    “When it comes to who’s got the best toys,” I said, “always bet on the Droods.”
    I started towards him, and he thrust the monkey’s hand at me while shouting some particularly nasty Words. The influence from the monkey’s hand hit me hard, like walking into an invisible wall, but still I pressed forward, all the power in my armour driving me on. Thinking of what Crow Lee had done to my family. Of what he’d ordered Major Michaels to do to my Molly. Thinking of my hands around Crow Lee’s throat. My golden armour began to seethe and boil, and then to melt and run away, falling off in large golden clumps of semiliquid metal. But I kept going. Even as the monkey’s power hit me