Finally the left hand gate broke from its hinges, and was flung with a great crash onto the driveway. Gravel sprayed out in a wide arc, and the fragments that struck Rosemary seemed to mobilize her into some sort of action.

  She screamed and began to run.

  'Rosemary! Get to the house!'

  Brady's cry echoed through the late afternoon. Bill Suchock stumbled after his wife, who instead of running to safety, was racing around the side of the building. A piece of wood the size of a brick struck Suchock a hefty blow on the side of the head and he stopped, turning to stare at the gateway, blood streaming from the gash on his temple. He seemed undecided as to what to do, then with a last glance to where Rosemary had vanished, he returned to Brady. Brady led him into the house, realizing that Suchock was stunned almost out of his wits. When he tried to speak only an unintelligible jumble of words emerged.

  Brady opened the back door and stepped out, just this side of the mazon. Rosemary, hands on her head, was running like an animal pursued, her screams loud and hysterical, quite uncontrolled. Brady called to her, and stepped into the mazon. At the sound of his voice she stopped, stared at him, eyes streaming with tears. Then a great gusting wind blew at her, bowling her backwards onto the ground. Light, or fire, seemed to flicker around her. The apple trees bent and swayed in the storm, their branches whipping at the earth below them.

  'Run to the house!' Brady again shouted, and stepped even further towards his sister.

  The thought-form was almost at her. Brady could smell it. His gaze was drawn to the place where it stood, just inside the brick wall. There were no visible signs of it, but the drifting smoke from the nearest brazier seemed to coil and writhe about the insubstantial form that lurked there.

  Rosemary picked herself up from the ground. She saw Brady and started to come towards him, and her face was open, panic-stricken, her mouth moving silently, now, in a plea for help. A second later she stopped, seemed to look up and around her, her hands waving pointlessly about. She was at the edge of the zona magnetica, trying to step forward. But she couldn't move. She edged to the side, and slowly the expression on her face turned to one of fearful terror. 'I can't move . . .' she whined, and her voice became loud, 'I can't move ... I can't get through . . .'

  What the hell was she talking about?

  Brady stepped further forward. Only a few yards separated them. He would drag her into the house by force.

  Ellen's sudden touch on his shoulder startled him. 'Leave her.'

  'What d'you mean, leave her? I can't just leave her.'

  Ellen's whispered voice was urgent, edged with panic. 'She's stuck, Dan. She can't break the psychic barrier. Can't you see that? Her reason has gone, and she's trapped there as effectively as if she were a thought-form herself!'

  'What?' Brady's horrified cry was almost drowned by a sudden, deafening cracking sound, like the splitting of a thick beam of timber, but far more explosive. It had not been thunder. Cold rain began to sleet down from the miserable grey skies, blowing hard and icy against him. Rosemary raised her hands and stared at the water falling on them, touched her suddenly drenched hair, as if she could hardly believe what was happening.

  Something to her right startled her. She began to back away from whatever she could see, hands raised before her in a feeble attempt at self-protection. Then she sobbed, loudly and passionately, the sob more scream than sorrow. Turning, she began to flee. Brady thought he glimpsed an immense grey shape loping after her, wolverine but upright, and with the broad, mongoloid face of the drooling, dead-featured human that he had seen before. The vision had been fleeting, the sensation of a sleek grey shape, its legs effortlessly carrying it towards the running, bedraggled woman.

  'I can't let this happen!' Brady cried, and began to break through the various zones around the house, pursuing his sister, blind to the danger, not even knowing how to defend himself against the Stalker.

  He had taken just ten paces when Rosemary's raincoat was torn from her shoulders, and four great rents appeared in her clothing. A second later her body was whipped up into the air, then flung forty yards across the garden, into the branches of the tall oak, where it wedged between two gnarled limbs, a limp rag doll, its arms and legs still twitching, face staring blindly.

  Brady felt sick with shock. It had happened so fast. He backed away from where he knew the thought-form to be. The smouldering herbs in the braziers irritated his senses, even through the light, cold rain. He stumbled on the edge of the turf maze outside the french windows, then realized that the Stalker was coming rapidly towards him.

  Ellen's sudden hold on him was powerful, unrelenting. She dragged him into the cold lounge of the house, making him step round the gold wire. They stood at the back of the room and watched as the psychic substance of George Campbell's mind moved quickly through the french windows and began to dissipate, spreading out to seek those it needed to kill.

  A moment later it had entered the gold and coppered pentagram. There was an unearthly screech, neither animal, nor human. Brady thought he could see a vaguely human shape struggling to get out of the confining space of the pentangle. The face that he glimpsed was dead, its tiny eyes dulled as it looked at him. The mouth was a simple gash, glistening in the pallid flesh, opening and closing, a reptilian horror created as much by his own fear as by the man who was projecting it. There were a number of air shocks, explosive decompressions that sucked the air from Brady's lungs. The room filled with a sweet, sickly odour, which vanished as quickly as it had appeared. There was a dull thump behind Brady, and when he glanced round he saw that the plaster and brick of the wall by the hallway door had been dented to a depth of several inches. Across the lounge, a window exploded outwards.

  'Random energy!' Ellen shouted, crouching as something struck the wall beside her, and caused a crack to appear from ceiling to floor.

  Within the pentagram, the chaos stopped. There was emptiness and silence, and yet Brady felt a strong sense of unease. It was an unnatural stillness; it wasn't right.

  'Ellen. Wait,' he said, but Ellen waved him silent, stepping gingerly forward, towards the trap. Brady stepped forward too, his hands held out from his body, the attitude of a man ready to run at the slightest danger. He peered into the face of the mirror and saw that the silvered coating was scratched and marked, as if by claws.

  'Gotcha!' Ellen said with a frail smile, and glanced at Brady. Her eyes radiated triumph. 'We've got it. Trapped. We've got Campbell.'

  'I don't like it,' Brady said. 'I'm uneasy.'

  'With what? It's trapped. There . . .' she stabbed at the mirror. 'Its random energy has been expended. It'll decay naturally, over the course of a few hours.'

  She stood and made to step into the pentagram, to pick the mirror up.

  'No! Ellen!'

  Brady's cry came too late. She was half across the gold wire, glancing curiously at him, when her body was suddenly flung upwards, against the ceiling, with a sound like a thunder-clap.

  'OH GOD!' was all she managed, a desperate cry, sudden awareness, and sudden death, combined into a a shriek of pure terror. Her face turned as black as soot. Brady reached to her, his mouth open in shock, his mind numbed.

  He tried to reach out of his body, to grapple the thought-form as he had fought it once before -

  For a fleeting second he was aware of the shapeless mass that was killing the woman, felt a transient touch of mind on mind. But it was too late, and he could not control the talent sufficiently.

  'ELLEN!'

  He heard bones snap. There was a sound like flesh being struck. Her eyes bulged in the blackened flesh of her face, lips drew back in terrible pain. He heard two gasps, strangled words. 'Mirror . . . silk . . .'

  And then she was silent, ceasing to struggle. Her body struck the floor and lay there without moving, its face turned away from Brady, who collapsed to his knees, staring at the dead girl, the tears welling up in his eyes.

  Random energy, a last assault before the snare took it fully, whatever it had been, it had gone now. The room was filled with an intense calm.

  'One mistake . . .' Brady murmured through his stifled sobs, and shook his head. 'One mistake . . .'

  He looked towards the french windows. The rain was still falling, blown by the gusting wind. He could see Rosemary's torn raincoat lying on the saturated grass.

  And he could hear a distant whimpering: the half-conscious sobbing of the broken woman who was his sister.

  17

  * * *

  The pain began and he knew at once that something had gone wrong. The sensation in his skull and stomach were totally unfamiliar to him. In his skull, it was like the closing down of a camera shutter, a tremendous pressure applied to the tissues. In his stomach it was as if fingers delved among his organs, twisting and knotting the tubes and lobes of his viscera.

  The intangible umbilical cord that connected with his thought-form stretched out before him, and seemed to shrivel and wither, the life force between mind and elemental strangled and blocked.

  He sat in the darkness and allowed himself to emit two shrill, brief screeches of agony, eyes squeezed shut, breath bursting from his body with such pressure that, following each cry, he felt a moment's relief.

  What could possibly have happened?

  Slowly he reached for the light. The illumination of his small room allowed him to see that all was normal. The coloured patterns before him, the mannikins, the clay images, the iron talisman, the names of power written in wax on the intricate symbol of Mars.

  But within the last twenty seconds the thought-form, the most powerful projection he had ever conjured, had become lost from him.

  It was just not possible!

  He had experienced nothing like this ever before. The elemental always drained back to him, renewing him, revitalizing his tiring body. But now, he sensed that the elemental was lost.

  His hand shook. The pain in his skull grew more unbearable. The edges of his vision began to crowd in, making the room seem darker than it was. He knew that saliva was dripping from his parted lips, but he no longer had the strength to raise a hand and wipe his mouth.

  I'm dying . . .

  And through the agony of physical discomfort, and rapidly ensuing unconsciousness, the thought came to him that if the loss of his vital energy didn't kill him, the mandrathon would. Even now he could hear the rapid clicking, and the rhythmic chinking sound, like metal on metal, that told of the nearness of a targeting psychic force.

  I'm beyond help . . .

  Judith was in Norfolk. She had not wanted to go, but he had insisted, making more excuses than should have been credible. She had gone and he was alone in the house. Beyond help.

  His thoughts became confused. His vision had narrowed until he could hardly see. The mandrathon approached, and he knew - it was among the last coherent thoughts he managed - that it would see at once how he had failed.

  Such a simple task. So simple a task to accomplish. How is it possible that I failed so badly?

  The noise of the thought-form increased. His limbs felt paralysed, the pressure in his skull more than intolerable, but there was no strength left to scream. Distantly, as he sank further into oblivion, he heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs. The room shook, a cool breeze touched his skin. Someone - or some thing - had burst into his haven, battering down the door to get to him.

  As he jerked his head back, lolling helplessly in his chair, he saw a familiar figure through the greyness, the figure of a man, leaning close, reaching out to him . . .

  It was Daniel Brady.

  Here, in the house! Brady!

  And he knew, then, that his doom was sealed.

  The stench was appalling.

  Brady fought his rising gorge, willing himself not to vomit. Campbell had been doubly incontinent, and his shirt front was spattered with pale vomit. Brady could scarcely believe that this broken, dying thing was his Director, and a man whose mental power had been at war with him for many weeks.

  Clearly, the man was being killed. There were bruise marks on his face, and his eyes were swollen, almost completely closed. His mouth gaped, the tongue protruding slightly. He had collapsed in his chair, and he seemed to regard Brady as he sprawled there, but Brady could not believe that anything much in the way of reason was left in this shattered man.

  He placed the shotgun on the table, among the bizarre trinkets and talismans of Campbell's secret trade. Leaning down he slapped Campbell's face twice, trying to revive some spark of consciousness.

  Behind the puffed lids, Campbell's eyes glittered. He was watching the man he had tried to kill.

  'Campbell! Can you hear me? Campbell!' He wanted to kill him, to throttle him, to take the gun and smash the drooling face to a pulp.

  But he wanted an answer first.

  Dropping to a crouch, desperately trying to put the agony of the stench out of his awareness, Brady held Campbell's head between his hands and shouted at him: 'My family! My children! Are they alive? Tell me! Tell me, damn you. Are they still alive?'

  Campbell's mouth moved. Saliva dripped, and bubbled on his lips. Brady shook the man's head. 'Are they alive? Tell me!'

  Sound came from the man's throat, a gurgling, incoherent murmur. Brady leaned close, desperate to hear the words. If Campbell was resisting him even now, then by God he would smash the man's skull.

  There was something in the room, something watching; he could smell something sharp, like the mandrake braziers ... it was a Stalker, it had to be. But who was it after?

  'My children. Answer me, Campbell. For the love of God, there's nothing I can do for you now. I beg you, help

  me. Answer me. Where are they? Are they alive?'

  And this time as he listened to the dying breath of the man, he heard the word, 'Alive . . .' repeated twice.

  Brady felt tears sting his eyes. It had to be true. Dear God, please let it be true.

  He stared at Campbell. 'Are you sure! Are they truly alive?'

  As if summoning the last vestiges of strength, Campbell nodded his head. His left hand raised from the arm of the chair and fell heavily on Brady's wrist. The fingers clutched convulsively. Campbell's eyes widened slightly, and Brady could see that the whites were congested with blood, the pupils narrowed to mere pin-pricks.

  'Where are they held? Tell me that? Where is my family now?'

  'North . . .' murmured the dying man, the spittle bubbling on his lips and making the word hard to hear. 'North . . . rach . . . nee . . . all. . . live . . . not. . . long . . . Brady ... fail... kill. .

  'What are you saying, Campbell? I don't understand! They're alive, but not for long? Is that what you said?'

  'Mandrath . . . attack . . .'

  'I don't understand!' Growing frustration. The presence in the room was almost tangibly threatening. 'Who took my family?'

  Campbell forced himself upright and his face came close to Brady's. His foul breath made Brady wince, but Brady stayed close, willing Campbell to say more.

  'Arach . . . awakening . . .' gasped the dying man. 'They've . . . come back . . . power ... no time . . .'

  'I don't understand! Campbell, I don't understand! Are my family alive but not for long? Is that what you mean?'

  Campbell fell back. The hand on Brady's wrist slipped away. Brady thought he heard the word 'yes' whispered, and then a peculiar whining sound began to issue from Campbell's glistening mouth. His hands convulsively slapped to his head. He jerked bolt upright in the chair. His eyes bulged and he began to screech.

  Brady stood and backed away. The room had become icily cold, and the walls ... the walls seemed to be melting

  In alarm, feeling the panic surfacing inside him, he looked around at the way the plaster seemed to be dripping from the walls. The desk was melting too, the objects on it flowing and distorting out of their true shapes. The ceiling drooped in the middle, threatening to crash down upon the two men in the room.

  Brady stepped to the door quickly. Campbell's screaming reached its highest pitch and the man stood, fists clenched against the sides of his head, which suddenly began to peel, the flesh tearing away from the bone in ragged strips, like a pink banana. The skull still stared; the hands were twisted and snapped, bones crushed audibly.

  Brady raised the shotgun and emptied both barrels into the face of the bloody-boned horror that had once been a man.

  Then he turned and fled, from the house, through the garden with its well-concealed defences, across the low brick wall at the bottom, and to his car, parked discreetly a hundred yards away.

  Behind him he heard an explosion and saw flame begin to lick high into the dusk sky.

  EPILOGUE

  * * *

  After he had dismantled the trap, he picked up the green and silvered mirror and toyed with the idea of smashing it. But Ellen's last words had referred to 'silk', and he went upstairs to the main bedroom, seeking among Alison's clothes for the black silk scarf he had bought for her some years ago. He tied the scarf around the small mirror, completely covering the face. Then he lay it flat, on the dressing table, and as if he felt it would help he placed a heavy book on top of it.

  He didn't know what else to do.

  Bill Suchock rang from the hospital. He was upset, still very shaken. Rosemary was physically out of danger, broken bones and very bad lacerations to her upper torso. She would pull through all right.

  Physically.

  'I don't know what to say, Bill.'

  'Say nothing, then. Just pray for her. Pray for her mind. You haven't forgotten how to pray, have you?'

  'No,' said Brady. 'I haven't forgotten that.'