Juni is currently in Lord Loss’s kingdom, with her master. But as soon as she moves, Kernel will know and we’ll blaze into action.
I’ve spent a lot of time with Beranabus. He’s changed so much over the centuries, made himself hard and uncaring, believing he had to be like a demon in order to fight the Demonata. It helped that he is half-demon. There’s a monster within him, always active, struggling to rise to the surface. Beranabus has to fight it constantly to maintain control, but through those battles he’s learnt more about demons and their ways than he ever could have otherwise.
One of his greatest fears is that he’ll go insane and the demon within him will take over. It would be the ultimate irony—the man who spent all his life battling to save humans from the Demonata turns into one of them and goes on a massive killing spree.
Beranabus can discuss such fears with me because I already know about them. I absorbed his secrets along with his memories, so he can’t hide them from me. I know almost as much about the ancient magician as he does.
“Sometimes I wonder if my life’s been worthwhile,” he muttered last night when we were apart from the others. “I’ve gone without pleasure or company for most of my years. If we lose and the Demonata kill us all, there won’t have been a point. Maybe I should have settled, married, had children, lived a normal life. It might not have made any difference in the end.”
I tried to make him see that millions of people owe their lives to him, that the Demonata would have taken over our world many centuries before this if not for his stubborn resistance. But he’s fallen into a dark state of mind. I think partly it’s because of my return. I’ve made him aware of all that he’s missed out on. If he’d allowed himself to be more human, he’d have had friends and family, and perhaps been much happier.
I’m sitting beneath the shade of a bony tree, trying to think of a way to ease Beranabus’s troubled mind. Someone coughs close by, disturbing me. I open my eyes and find Dervish standing there. “Mind if I sit down?”
I nudge over. When he’s sitting, he smiles awkwardly. We haven’t said much to each other since he recovered. I think he’s embarrassed—we’d had that big conversation prior to the attacks, but never had a chance to wrap it up.
“How are you getting on?” he asks.
“Not too bad.”
“It’s pretty boring here, huh?”
I shrug. “I’d rather this to the excitement of fighting demons.”
He strokes one of his newly grown spikes. “What do you think of the hair?”
“Some of the warriors in my time styled their hair like that,” I tell him.
“Yeah?” He looks proud.
“But they were all a lot younger than you.”
He pulls a face. “I started going bald early, so I had no choice other than adapt. But I never liked looking like the crown of an egg.”
“Baldness suits old men.”
“I’m not…” he starts to protest, then sighs. “No, you’re right, I am old. It happened while I wasn’t looking. Old, bald, dodgy heart, ignorant.”
“Ignorant?” I echo.
“The way I treated you,” he says softly. “I was an ignorant old man. If Billy or Grubbs had seen me acting that way, they’d have kicked me hard and told me to stop being an idiot.”
“You were upset,” I excuse him. “People do strange things when they lose a loved one.”
“I should have known better,” he grunts. “I would have been more sensitive a few years ago, but you don’t see things so clearly when you let yourself become a grumpy old fogey. I used to criticise Ma and Pa Spleen—Billy’s grandparents—for being cranky and small-minded. But I was turning into a carbon copy of them.” He shudders.
“Bill-E loved his grandparents regardless of their flaws,” I say. “He would have gone on loving and forgiving you too, no matter what.”
“How about you?” Dervish asks.
I frown uncomfortably. I should say something diplomatic, but I was reared to speak my mind. “I don’t love you. I hardly even know you.”
“I didn’t mean that,” Dervish says quickly. “I meant, can you forgive me? Can we be friends? Or will I always be the ogre who made you tell him stories about a dead boy for months on end?”
“You’ll always be an ogre,” I say seriously, then laugh at his expression. “I’m joking. Of course we can be friends.”
“We can start over?” he says eagerly. “Get to know each other properly?”
I nod and he sticks out a hand to shake on the deal.