Live and Let Drood

creation. Mourning his mistake. I made myself look away from what might yet be my future. I looked steadily at the rogue armour.
    “Do it.”
    It surged forward, too fast for human eyes to follow. I raised an arm in self-defence in spite of myself, and the armour flowed over the arm in a golden wave and hit me in the face. The rogue armour engulfed me in a moment, encasing me from head to foot. I think I screamed. It was nothing like what happened when I called my armour. I can’t remember most of what happened that first time, though sometimes there are hints in certain nightmares I try very hard not to remember. I know it was cold, terribly cold, not just of the body, but of the soul. There was cold and then there was darkness as the armour cut off my senses, replacing them with its own. I was alone in the dark, and then there was a presence with me. Not human, but more than just inhuman. Something that had no nature of its own and so had made one for itself; a personality ripped from the darker parts of its creator’s mind, born of hate and rage, refined into a delight in such things for its own sake. It could feel how I felt about that. It found it…funny.
    Light filled my eyes, dispersing the darkness, and I was open to the world again. I stood in the Maze, panting hard, trembling, forcing calm and self-control. I looked down at myself and saw only gold. I lifted my hands and turned them back and forth before me, and they were the heavy golden gauntlets I had seen before on Moxton’s Mistake. The armour felt as much a second skin as my old armour had, but there was…a distance now between me and the world. As though I was receiving all my impressions of it secondhand. The presence was gone, but I still had the sense of someone looking over my shoulder. There was no trace of the metal voice in my head, but I knew it was still there. Watching and waiting.
    I felt strong and vital, more than human, but also full of anger for my enemies, for those who had dared strike at my family. I ached forrevenge, for the chance to get my hands on my enemy and make him pay…feelings that might not have been entirely mine.
    I turned and strode quickly through the hedgerows. With my golden armour about me, I could now clearly see the shining, shimmering lifeline that fell away before me, stretching off into the distance. The connection Molly had made between us. It was lovely to look at, but I had no time for that. I hurried on, moving faster and faster, following the thread out of the Maze. It took me a while to get my balance, training my new armour to move in a human way. But soon enough I was running headlong, my long legs eating up the distance while my arms pumped tirelessly at my sides. My heavy feet tore open the grass beneath me and threw up earth divots in my wake. It felt good to be running so freely, to be exceeding human limitations again, after being limited to merely human moves for so long. And soon, soon I came to the entrance to the Maze and burst through and out of it, back into the world again, where my Molly was waiting for me.
    Molly Metcalf took one look at me and hit me with every bit of magic at her command. Terrible energies flared and spat on the air around her upraised hands, striking out to pound against my armoured chest and head, forcing me to an abrupt halt and then slamming me backwards, step by step, impact by impact, forcing me back towards the Maze entrance. But whatever its origin, this was still Drood armour, and I quickly recovered my balance and dug in my heels. I stood my ground, actually leaning forward into her magical attack, and her vicious energies broke and burst against my golden metal, detonating harmlessly about me. Molly scowled fiercely, her flashing dark eyes focused and determined, and hit me again and again with her best sorcerous attacks. And I just stood there and took it.
    And then I raised one hand and wagged a single pointed golden finger at her, more in sorrow than in anger. Molly froze. And while her assault was stopped, I concentrated in a certain way and the new armour retreated into my torc. Leaving me open and revealed to the world and my Molly. Her look of surprise was actually comical, but I had enoughsense not to laugh. I looked about me. The world seemed a duller and flatter thing now, perceived only through my human senses, but it was still a warm and lovely place and I was glad to be back in it. I fell to my knees as the day’s burdens rushed in upon