Live and Let Drood

original Drood seals and protections. In which case none of this is hidden anymore from the eyes of the world. The whole place probably lit up like a beacon. If someone was lying in wait, keeping an eye on things here…”
    “Then they just got an eyeful,” said Molly. “Any chance this watching someone might be Crow Lee or one of his people?”
    “Seems likely,” I said. “If he’d learned enough about my family’s secrets to remotely control Alpha Red Alpha, who knows what else he knows? You don’t get to be the Most Evil Man in the World without keeping three steps ahead of everyone else. Whoever’s watching knows what’s just happened. They might not know exactly what was hidden here, but they must know it’s out in the open now and vulnerable.”
    “So they’ll be coming for it,” said Molly.
    “Seems likely,” I said.
    “They’re already here,” said Molly. “That’s what we heard. It’s mummies. I just know they’ve sent mummies after us.…”
    “Look on the bright side,” I said. “Might not be mummies; could be daddies.”
    “Really not helping here, Eddie! I hate mummies! They’re going to come crashing through the walls, I just know it, dusty old things wrapped in rotting bandages, and they’ll wrap their horrible arms around me, and…”
    “Easy, girl. Easy! I can see years of therapy starting right here.” I put my hands on her shoulders and gripped them comfortingly. “Molly…What are you so scared of? You’re the wild witch of the woods, free spirit of anarchy and queen of all the wild places!”
    “If fears were rational,” said Molly, with some dignity, “they wouldn’t be fears. Would they?”
    “How old were you when you first saw this mummy film?”
    “Five. Maybe six.”
    “Well, you’re not five or six anymore. You’re not a helpless child anymore. You are a very grown-up, very powerful, very adorable and only sometimes scary adult. Anything in bandages turns up, you set fire to it and I will stamp it into the floor. Okay?”
    “Okay,” said Molly. “Thanks, Eddie. What are you afraid of?”
    “Losing you.”
    She smiled. “You say the nicest things, sweetie.” And then she stopped and held herself very still, only her eyes moving. “Look around you, Eddie. Are you seeing what I’m seeing? Our shadows are moving…and we’re not.”
    “In fact,” I said, holding myself very still, too, “there are far too many shadows in this chamber. The enemy is with us, Molly. On guard.”
    I armoured up, the cold metal rushing over me in a moment. I kept the compass enclosed with one hand inside the armour. Molly sent up a ball of witchlight from her hand to bob against the low ceiling, providing illumination while leaving her hands free to do more destructive things. We moved quickly to stand back-to-back, without having to discuss it. We’d danced this dance before. I actually felt a lot better now that I had a proper enemy to confront. Shadows danced wildly all around the stone chamber, deep and dark and menacing. Full of an awful, inhuman life. They took on human shapes, distinct but distorted, the better to terrify us, and entirely separate from Molly and me…leaping and jumping, stretched across the bare stone walls. They had nothing to do with Molly’s witchlight; they were something from outside. No faces on their dark heads, not even any eyes, but still the shadows seemed to know exactly where Molly and I were.
    They whipped around the chamber, circling us like sharks, darting in and out, peeling themselves away from the walls to threaten Molly and me with sudden sharp movements. Dancing like demons, jumping and stretching and moving closer to us with every attack. They swirled around us, leaping and looming. Mocking, maddening things.
    “Can I just quietly remind you that self-control would be a very good thing right now,” I said quietly to Molly. “One destructive blast inthe wrong place might well bring this whole place down on our heads. And we really are a very long way underground.…”
    “Like I need you to tell me that,” said Molly. “Self-control, carefully aimed destruction and brutality and viciousness at close quarters; that’s what’s needed here. Look at the stupid things jumping up and down and trying to be scary.…We can handle a bunch of shadows.”
    I smiled briefly behind my mask. “Of course we can. We are, after all, professionals.”
    And then all the shadows attacked at once, plunging in at us from