They knew real demons when they saw them. Lilith just laughed at the Demonz, said Children shouldn't stray so far from home, snapped her pale fingers, and sent all the Demonz back to Hell again.

After that, she went to Time Tower Square, deserted but almost untouched by the chaos all around. Lilith struck a mocking pose before the blocky stone structure that was the Tower, and called loudly for Old Father Time to come out and face her. She had work for him. Minutes passed, and Lilith snarled and stamped her feet as she realised Old Father Time wasn't coming out. She ordered her offspring to tear the Tower apart, and drag Old Father Time from the ruins to face her displeasure. But, as I knew to my cost, the Tower was seriously defended. The first few Beings to touch the Tower with bad intent just disappeared, blown out of existence like the flame of a candle. Other, greater Powers advanced on the Tower. A terrible stone Eye opened in the wall facing them, and the Powers froze in the glare of that awful regard. The life seeped out of them, and left behind only a handful of ugly stone statues, in awkward poses. The great stone Eye slowly closed again.

Lilith cried out a single angry Word, and the whole stone structure blew apart, until there was nothing left of the Time Tower save a pile of smoking rubble. Lilith glared at what she'd achieved, shaking with effort and reaction, while her army watched carefully to see what would happen next. In the end, it was clear that Old Father Time was either dead or trapped. Either way, he wouldn't be coming out to obey Lilith's wishes, so she spat and cursed, turned on her heel and led her army on to other ventures.

And that brought me up to date. The scrying pool had gone cloudy with shock and trauma, and I left it sobbing quietly to itself. The shop's owner trailed behind me as I left his emporium, complaining bitterly and wringing his hands over what I'd done to his best merchandise. I told him again to send the bill to Walker.

Outside the shop, it was relatively quiet. The fires had run out of things to burn, and the survivors were keeping their heads down and quietly licking their wounds. I walked slowly through deserted streets, and no-one bothered me. Just as well. I had some thinking to do. Why had Lilith been so determined to control Old Father Time? Could there be something about Time travel, or perhaps Time itself, that would be a danger to Lilith's plans? I smiled mirthlessly. It beat the hell out of me. I needed advice and information, which meant… I needed to talk to Walker.

I pulled my Strangefellows Membership Card from my pocket, activated it, and called for Walker. After making me wait a little while, to keep me respectful, Walker's face looked out of the Card at me. He looked calm and poised and completely confident. He might have got away with it, if he hadn't also looked like hell.

"Taylor!" he said brightly. "Back at last, after your extended vacation? I should have known you'd turn up for the main event. I didn't know these Cards could be used for communication."

So Alex didn't tell you everything, I thought, a little smugly. "I'm back," I said. "We need to talk."

"Couldn't agree more, old chap," said Walker. "I need to know everything you know."

"We don't have that much time," I said. I never could resist a good cheap shot. "Right now, we need to talk to the Authorities. Get their resources behind us. They need to hear what I have to tell them. I need you to set up a meeting."

"I've been trying to contact them ever since this whole mess started," said Walker, just a little tartly. "No-one's returning my calls."

"Call them again," I said. "Drop my name, and set up a meet. We need to do this in person. They'll talk to Lilith's son."

"Yes," said Walker. "Yes, they just might. Very well, I'll arrange a face-to-face, at the Londinium Club."

"Of course," I said. "Where else?"

Nine

Thrown to the Wolves

I found an undead Harley Davidson lurking in an alleyway, and persuaded it to give me a lift to the Londinium Club, in return for squeezing the essential juices out of several nearby corpses into the undead machine's fuel tank. I swear other people don't have days like this. The motorcycle carried me smoothly