clearly in the hush left by neither of us firing. “And I say that there’s nowhere left for you to go. The Armoury ends here. So come out. Or I’ll just destroy everything that’s left, and you with it. Come out! Now!”
My parents stepped out from behind their place of shelter and stood together facing me. Charles and Emily Drood had been my attackers, trying to kill me and Molly, all along. They didn’t look guilty, or ashamed, or afraid. They kept their energy weapons pointed at the floor, but didn’t actually drop them until I ordered them to. I was so shocked, so full of contradictory emotions, that I could barely speak. Even after they’d dropped their weapons, they didn’t take their eyes off me for a moment. They didn’t look like beaten opponents, or cornered animals; they looked like professionals experiencing a temporary setback. Just waiting for me to make a mistake, or have a lapse in judgement, so they could jump me. I didn’t know what to say. I heard Molly come forward to stand beside me, picking her way carefully through the wreckage I’d made of the Armoury. I didn’t look at her.
“Oh, Eddie,” she said, “I’m so sorry.”
“You tried to kill me,” I said to Charles and Emily.
“And me!” said Molly.
“Why?” I said. Not quite shouting it.
“It’s the Game,” said Charles.
“You have to play the Game, to win,” said Emily.
“And we needed to win,” said Charles. “With what we owe . . .”
“I knew we couldn’t trust them,” said Molly. “They abandoned you as a child. Hid from you for years. Traded away your soul, at Casino Infernale! Remember?”
“Yes,” I said. “But . . .”
“Look at them!” said Molly. “They’ve made up their minds! They’ll still kill you, first chance they get. There’s only one way this can end, Eddie. Only one way you and I can be safe. You have to kill them. Right here, right now. While you’ve got the upper hand.”
I was so shocked that I actually took my eyes off my parents for a moment. “I can’t kill them! I can’t kill my mother and my father!”
“You have to!” said Molly.
“No,” I said. “I won’t play the Game. And I won’t kill. I don’t do that any more.”
“You have to,” said Molly. “If you won’t do it for yourself, do it for me.”
“I can’t believe you’re asking me to do this! And I don’t believe my parents would do this . . .”
That was when the insight hit me. I stepped back, so I could watch Molly as well as Charles and Emily. So I could cover all of them with my machine guns. I looked from Molly, to Charles and Emily, and then back again. So shocked and sickened now that I could barely get my breath.
“You’re not my parents,” I said. “And you; you’re not Molly. You’re all just . . . parts of the environment, brought to life. But why?”
Charles and Emily stood very still, looking at me with blank faces and empty eyes. Like actors who couldn’t be bothered to play their parts any longer. Molly looked puzzled, as though I’d just cracked a joke and she didn’t get it.
“That’s why you don’t have any magic,” I said to her. “Because an animated scrap of scenery couldn’t fake that. It’s why you’ve been acting so out of character, needing me to protect you. The real Molly never needed to be protected by anyone. And she would never have tried to pressure me into murdering my own parents.”
“Eddie, come on . . . ,” said Molly. “This is me! Really! Stop this. You’re scaring me.”
I glared at Charles and Emily. “I don’t believe in you. I don’t believe in any of this!”
And the wrecked Armoury just faded away, like a bad dream. Taking Emily and Charles, or the things that looked just like them, with it. All that remained was a featureless grey plain, stretching away forever. It didn’t even try to feel like a real location. It was just a place for Molly and me to be, as we stood facing each other. I did wonder, briefly, if this was what the Shifting Lands really looked like when there was no one around to give them shape and purpose and meaning. I looked at Molly, and she looked back at me.
“Stop it, Eddie!” she said. “It’s not funny. Stop it right now. I’m Molly. Your Molly. You know that!”
“Stop pretending,” I said.
“I’m not pretending! I’m Molly Metcalf!”
I