Nightside 11 - A Hard Days Knight

“Go on. Try something. I’ve always wanted to be amusing.”
    I looked directly at Stark, who was staring out across the bloody Court, ignoring us all. “Do you still think you can make a deal with Merlin? After everything you’ve seen here? This was Camelot, the birth of a wonderful dream. And look what he’s done to it.”
    Stark turned his empty gaze on me. “I’m only waiting because Merlin said he wouldn’t close the deal until you two were here to witness it. You fascinate Merlin. He lusts to see you broken.”
    “Nasty man,” said Suzie. It wasn’t immediately obvious whom she meant.
    “Enough,” said Morgan Le Fae. She leaned forward on her throne, her face ugly with anticipation. “Break them, my King, with pain and horror and despair. Tear away their insulting pride and make them grovel before us. Make them love us and plead to serve us.”
    Suzie laughed in Morgan’s face. “Not a hope in hell, bitch. We don’t do that.”
    “But you will,” said Merlin. “Anyone can be broken. And the more defiant you are, the sweeter my triumph will be.”
    “Don’t shoot him, Suzie,” I said quietly. “Not yet.”
    “Why not?” said Suzie, in a perfectly reasonable tone of voice.
    “Because that’s Merlin Satanspawn, the anti-Christ, and the most powerful sorcerer, ever. And I don’t have nearly as much faith in your cursed and blessed ammo as you do. And because I haven’t finished with Stark yet. He has to have his chance, to do the right thing.” I turned back to Stark. “You were a London Knight. You led their armies into war against the powers of evil. Did you ever think you’d end up in a place like this, begging to make a deal with the anti-Christ? You swore an oath, upon your life and upon your honour, to fight things like him. How can you see what’s happened here and turn your head away?”
    “I am sickened by what I have seen,” said Stark. “I never knew such corruption, such evil, was possible. But I swore an oath to myself that I would do whatever I have to to get my love back.” He turned away from me, to address Merlin. “Your witnesses are here. You can have Excalibur—after you’ve given me what I want. My wife, alive again, for the sword. So do it. Do it now.”
    “You have hidden the sword well, Sir Jerusalem,” said Merlin. “All my power, and I can’t see it anywhere. And that’s one of the reasons why I want it. I don’t like the idea of anything existing that can defy my power. Let us make our deal. Because nothing can stop us now.”
    Suzie lifted her shotgun, and I was readying myself to do something. Then we all stopped dead and looked about us because something had changed in the Court. Something was coming. We could all feel it; something coming to Court from a direction I could sense but not name. Merlin sat up straight on his throne, looking round him with a look that was part apprehension and part anticipation. I gathered it wasn’t often anything happened in his Court that he didn’t expect. Morgan Le Fae had sunk back on her throne, a pale hand pressed to her pale mouth. She was an elf, and Saw more clearly than any of us. And then, Julianne Stark was standing in the bloody Court of Camelot, a ghost come to stand before the throne of Merlin, unsummoned and unafraid. She had fought her way here from the land of the dead because the man she loved was in danger. Because he needed her.
    “You can’t be here,” said Merlin. “I didn’t call you. Be gone, little ghost, or I’ll show you even the dead can be made to suffer.”
    “Hello, Jerry,” said Julianne, ignoring Merlin with magnificent disdain. “Glad to see me?”
    “Always,” said Stark. “But the sorcerer is right. You shouldn’t be here. I didn’t want you to know there could be a place like this. How can you be here when I didn’t summon you?” He looked down at the preserved heart in its spun-silver cage at his belt. His hand was nowhere near it, but Julianne looked solid and very real. He smiled at her, and she smiled at him, and the whole atmosphere in the Court changed, as though the sun had finally risen after a long night.
    “How could I stay away,” said Julianne, “when your very soul is in peril? It was easy to come here, Jerry. This is a world of ghosts.”
    “Julie, you have to let me do this. I’m doing it for you, for us ... because I can’t bear to go on living like this. Without you.”
    “I don’t want to live again,” said Julianne, holding