The Doctor turned away and sulked.

153.

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'What is Otherstide?' asked Dorothee.

'Just some silly pagan festival,' he mumbled. 'Like Yule or August Bank Holiday.'

Innocet viewed them severely. 'The Other was one of the Triumvirate who ruled the old world with Ra.s.silon and Omega.'

'Oh, yeah,' said Dorothee. 'As in the Hand of -,'

'Ace!'

'But the Other turned against Ra.s.silon and was banished,' ventured Leela. 'He stole away the Hand of Omega.'

Dorothee grinned. 'Real y?'

'Depending on which version you read,' said the Doctor.

Innocet stared directly at him. 'Otherstide celebrates his casting out. Now please come down to supper.'

The Doctor poked at the robes she had brought. 'Satthralope's only resurrecting it to give the House something to concentrate on.'

The gong sounded for the third time.

He peered straight into the depths of the mirror. 'No. I think I'll sit this one out.'

The library started to tremble.

Innocet stepped back as two chairs moved in on the Doctor. He immediately backed into the pa.s.sages between the shelves. The door flew open to admit a Drudge. It pulled Leela and Dorothee clear with hard fingers as the room went berserk.

The sense of rage hit them like a breaking wave.

Data cores were hurled out of their racking like missiles. Planks half tore themselves up from the floor and lunged at the Doctor. As he vanished from view among the swaying shelves, they saw the white branches that tangled across the ceiling break free and reach down like gnarled fingers.

They heard his shout and then al the shelving caved in over him.

'Doctor!' yel ed both Dorothee and Leela. There was no answer. And through all of it, Chris had stayed fast asleep.

154.

Chapter Twenty-six.

The Play's the Thing

'He wil come down,' said Innocet.

'He could be dead,' said Leela.

'Or injured,' said Dorothee. 'We should have stayed.'

'He wil come.'

The Doctor's Cousins and companions had waited an age in the Hall in embarra.s.sed silence for the Doctor to arrive.

The tall banqueting tables had been positioned round the House's Loom, with the gla.s.s casket containing the sleeping Quences suitably garlanded to form the centrepiece. Forty-five places were set around the table, but everyone present had cl.u.s.tered into two opposing groups at one end. No one's feet touched the floor.

Friends versus Family.

Everyone looked at the body on the table.

Something rumbled under the floor and then the huge flagstones burst open with a crash. A dishevelled shape was spewed up into the Hal from the depths.

The Doctor clambered awkwardly to his feet and surveyed the gathering, swaying slightly.

'Well, well. Gallifrey's most dysfunctional family!'

G.o.d, he's drunk, thought Dorothee. She climbed down from her seat to give him a place between herself and Leela. He was not wearing his formal attire and his clothes were dishevel ed and dusty. Behind him, the hole in the floor closed itself with a crunch and a sigh.

'Charming,' he said, caustically surveying the table. 'Cheer up, everyone. It's a party. Otherstide felicitations to you all!'

He flourished a trick bunch of feathery flowers out of his sleeve.

'Very festive,' said Dorothee. 'What happened to you?'

'You know what libraries are like. They can't stand anything to be overdue.' He was trying to be dismissive, but his voice tremored slightly. And he had a black eye. 'Satthralope must keep the House under tighter control. I've never been beaten up by a library before. I don't recommend it.'

He peered at Chris, who was asleep in the chair beyond Leela.

'We can't wake him,' she said. 'He's sleeping so deeply.'

Dorothee fol owed the Doctor's accusatory glance up to the roof, where a familiar shape hung in a net of cobwebs.

'Jesus, how did that get up there?'

'How do we get it down here?' he snapped.

'Is this how you treat al your friends?' Innocet called from across the table.

'No different from his Family,' said Rynde.

Leela whispered, 'Say the word, Doctor, and I will make these miserable Cousins of yours do you honour.'

155.

He shook his head. 'Don't worry about them. They haven't enjoyed themselves so much for centuries.'

He turned to the company. 'Now let me guess what's on today's menu.'

'Fish,' said Cousin Rynde.

'And my shopping,' added Dorothee. She nodded across the table at a tray stacked with slices of sun-dried tomato ciabatta.

'And feathergills,' said Owis, eagerly leaning forward to proffer a dish.

The Doctor frowned suspiciously at him. 'Is that my pullover?'

A row of woollen question marks peered from under Owis's tunic. 'Lose and weep, find and keep!' he chanted and proffered the dish again.

'Doctor, how much of it is true?' interrupted Innocet.

He ignored Owis's dish. 'Is what true?'

'That you wil deny me my place as next Housekeeper should we all survive.'

'He's Quences's successor,' interrupted Rynde. 'Given the chance, he'd throw us all out of our House.'

'What about me?' said Owis. 'He says I have no right to exist at all.'

'When are we going home?' said Jobiska.

While they bickered, the Doctor slowly removed his hat and played with the brim. 'Let's see what Quences has to say about it.'

There was sudden silence.

The Doctor glanced at Glospin, who was sitting apart from the others.

'I didn't say a word,' said his Cousin.

Quick as a flash, before his chair could object, the Doctor climbed on to the banqueting table and started threading his way between the candles and cut gla.s.s. A trail of footprints on the tablecloth marked his path towards the gla.s.s coffin.

There was uproar from the Cousins. Shouts of 'No!' and 'Don't touch him!'

'Why?' he said. 'What can you possibly be afraid of?' He bowed his head and laid his bunch of fake flowers on the coffin lid.

'Recquiescat in pace,' he said quietly.

'How dare you!' Satthralope's voice rang out through the Hall.

'All joints on the table wil be carved,' observed the Doctor, watching various condiment boats scuttle for cover.

Satthralope's cane clacked on the flagstones as she made her painful way to the table. The Drudges came behind her.

'Down, sir! By al the fires in the kitchen, down!'

The Doctor half smiled. Dorothee had a sudden unpleasant premonition that he was going to play the spoons. She glanced at Leela, who was fingering her knife.

156.

Instead, the Cousins watched open-mouthed as he sauntered up the table to meet the Housekeeper. When he reached her place setting, he knelt among the cutlery and bowed his head. 'Cousin Satthralope, thank you for your Housepitality. I am honoured.'

'Honour?' Her rage was scarcely under control. She lifted her eyes to the gal eries. 'There were some honourable people here once.'

Like an imperious sovereign, she lifted her ringed hand towards him.

The Doctor shrugged. 'Lives have hung on a signed contract here, a kissed ring there. Family favours meant precious little to me for many years.' He reached forward to kiss her wooden ring, but the old woman grabbed hold of his ear and pulled him off the table.

He yelped with pain and hit the floor, but her bony fingers held on tight.

Leela and Dorothee both scrambled to help him, but a Drudge blocked their way.

'What have you done with Quences's will?' demanded Satthralope, pulling his head back and forth by his ear.

His face was screwed up in agony. 'What have you done with the rest of my Cousins?'

'Wormholed little revenant! Sneaking back here!' She twisted his ear hard. 'I don't apologize for what the House threatens. It is very angry!'

She pushed him roughly away.

'Of course, it's angry,' he said from the floor. 'What do you expect when you buried it alive with all its Family?'

' I I buried it? Me?' Satthralope turned to scan the remnants of her Cousins. 'The House of Lungbarrow was so ashamed of what you did, that it buried buried it? Me?' Satthralope turned to scan the remnants of her Cousins. 'The House of Lungbarrow was so ashamed of what you did, that it buried itself itself and took us all with it!' and took us all with it!'

The Doctor gave a little moan of shock. He stumbled to his feet and stared up at the TARDIS, his hands slapping at his pockets. 'The will,' he muttered. 'I've got the will.'

Innocet had moved in beside him. 'Not now,' she muttered. 'You'll kill us al if you're not careful.' She took his arm and gently guided him back to his seat between Dorothee and Leela.

Satthralope had climbed up into her own place at the head of the table. 'At Otherstide, the time of renewal, we pledge our devotion to the House.'

'And my name day,' mumbled the Doctor ma.s.saging his ear. He signalled for his companions to stand. They let Chris sleep on while Satthralope sang the incantations.

'Book of Foundations. Chapter Prydon. Verse six seven three.'

'Lungbarrow,' responded the Cousins.

'We will always return to the Loom from which you wove us.'

'Ancient House.'