And that was Ponch's ending; simple as that.

Strange, it hadn't gone the way he'd expected it to at all. I mean, where was the big climactic fight? Yes, that would have been good: hordes of armoured soldiers suddenly appearing to help Hopkins, and then an invasion from the higher dimensions by the Old Ones, who had engineered the whole thing as a way of conquering the universe. That was more like it, a whole sight better than what he had actually come up with. For a start, this ending didn't make sense; there were loads of holes in the plot if you looked for them.

So the Doctor just realised there would be an alternate palace through the gateway, did he? And miraculously just happened to be right. Who would fall for that one? How come Hopkins and Neville got fused together and avoided the effects of the higher dimensions entirely? What is this higher dimension thing anyway?

The real reason it doesn't work is, of course, obvious. If Miranda Pelham had stayed behind in the higher dimensions with that big green thing, how could she have turned up here to tell him about it? Eh? Answer that one!

Lots of reasons why this ending is no good. There are hundreds of better ones he could think of. Anything rather than that.

Except, for some reason, Ponch knows he cannot change the ending. This is how it happened, he couldn't change it even if he wanted to. There is a correctness, a smoothness, an... what was that word... what was that word... an inevitability about this ending. an inevitability about this ending.

Even that thing about Pelham seems right. Don't ask him how he knows, he just does.

He has been out in the tundra a week now. After three days he was caught by a couple of hunting ur-dogs, sent out after him.

He had been sleeping inside one of the ancient barrow mounds, determined not to be afraid of the dusty bones and metal that were stacked inside, sculpted into strange ornate shapes from another, ancient age.

The ur-dogs, rare and valuable tracking hounds, with long snouts and two tireless stringy legs, had sniffed him down to the gra.s.sy mound. Ponch remembers the fear that woke him, the snuffling outside. He had known exactly what had come for him.

The old men of the township would have instructed the ur-dogs to keep his head unmarked. They would see to that first, ready for the fun they would have with the rest of him.

He imagined their salivating muzzles, their sour breath over him as one held him and the other ripped, feeling his muscles stretched tighter and tighter until...

Only their eagerness to make the kill had saved him. The ur-dogs whooped and gibbered, lit by the gleaming moon outside, savouring their rush into the barrow mound.

Ponch remembers finding the rusty pike, running it through the first of the beasts: a stubby, yellow, furred thing with an almost human face beneath the hair. He had screamed like a beast himself.

The second animal had dropped to its tiny, wizened forepaws and breathed short jolts of night steam towards him, its long tongue lapping up the stench of its partner's howling death.

It jumped, hard and quick, at him but Ponch was ready. He had clubbed its snout with the dagger he had grasped in his left hand. The force of its jump meant the blade sank deep. It was scrabbling all over him, screeching and biting with pain and anger. Ponch kept stabbing, given an advantage by the beast's reluctance to sink its teeth into his face.

At last, with the thing lying on top of him, breathing its sickening innards all over him, it stopped, and died, and that was that.

He left two heads on top of the barrow mound, so they would know who had done this.

Apart from that, Ponch has to admit to himself that the journey has been pretty quiet.

For some reason, the story makes him think of his past.

Perhaps it had been the old woman, perhaps she reminded him of his mother.

Except that he remembers nothing about a mother. No family whatsoever. He tries to think about his childhood and can't. Not that it has worried him before. Memories are a luxury here and, anyway, nothing ever changes. Just the same old foraging for furs in summer, the township in autumn, and the holing up for the inevitably terrible, culling winter. Waiting for the sun so they could start the whole thing off again. Only one day mattered, right at the end of the autumn, the one day around which all other days revolved; the day the guild sleds came out of the mountains to collect their treasures and distribute those precious gifts.

Now, Ponch can clearly remember last guild day, and definitely one before that. Vaguely, there is the recollection of a third but he cannot be certain. Before that, they all blur into one. He guesses he would say he had fifteen or so summers behind him, but is sad that this life has ground memory from him like chaff from a millstone, scattering the details. How can Pelham's story feel more real to him than his own past?

He knows now why he has come here. The old woman, Miranda Pelham, wanted him to discover the real secret. He had come to the mountains, to the home of the guild sleds, to fmd out who he is. Why he lives the life he does.

There is no mistaking that he is in the right place. The mountains here are oddly formed, regular, occasionally fortified with gigantic blocks of black stone.

He sees the cylindrical watchtowers, the battlements and ramparts Ofrin once boasted of seeing when he claimed to have visited this place once long ago.

No one has ever known people on these battlements. There is no movement of any kind. Of course, Janua lives here, the great G.o.d of the guild.

But there are other stories.

They say that it is the dead who inhabit the citadel of Janua, all the people that ever died, that this is where everyone goes when they eventually get killed; that they're deep underground, and that the living provide furs for their warmth, to stave off that particular eternal cold. He remembers imagining their skeletons wrapped in fur, the teeth grinning and chattering.

So this is where he must travel. There is a sharp drop to a faraway cave, right at the end of a long, overcast, snowy valley. Ponch can see it now. This is where he must travel.

He thinks of the old woman, how kind and vibrant she was, despite her great age. How she laughed all the time, even when she was angry, if that's possible, even when Ofrin threatened to kill her. She would not be afraid now, not of ghosts and phantoms.

Even better, think of the Doctor, always jumping feet first into trouble, always ready to take on the worst with a smile, a quip and that familiar mocking 'Well... ?'.

Yes, be like the Doctor. You don't know the dead live in there, you don't know what lives in there, so until you do, what is the point in being afraid? You always have to find out for yourself.

Bolstering himself up with this and many other new styles of thought, Ponch pulls the axe from his filthy fur coat and starts off into the valley.

The wind blows hard against him as he plods along. The permanent daylight of the summer sun is partially obscured by the sharp crags. There are more shadows, more dark s.p.a.ces to worry about. Ignore them, ignore it all and keep going.

Ponch begins to hear sounds, noises he has never heard before. A grinding of metal, a kind of m.u.f.fled roar of flame, deep below. He thinks of a fire, of the warmth and the lovely light on the cold long nights of trapping. The loneliness of so many months on your own, the constant vigilance and mistrust. Fire provides more than a physical warmth and he could really do with it right now.

Nothing here in this wilderness but rock and snow, except that which you make yourself. You had to grow up very quickly here. He hasn't seen many children. They are kept well hidden, along with the priceless child-bearers. How many make it, get to have any kind of life? How did he make it?

He wonders about the story. How old had Pelham said she had been? Forty-three? Was it possible people could live so long? So many questions. Despite his wariness, and the knowledge that he may never return from this place, Ponch thinks about a childhood he can no longer remember. It's about time he sorted out the answers.

He takes half a day to reach the black smudge at the far end of the valley. The ground here is weathered but artificial, smoothed and covered in some unfamiliar black substance.

The guild sleds have worn tracks into its skin and Ponch follows them.

All around him, the mountain has given way to the ancient citadel built into it. There is no natural rock left, everything has been shaped and carved, designed as a defence against some ma.s.sive besieging force. Some time ago though, Ponch realises. The ironwork has rusted completely, the bricks and fortifications and steps have crumbled and worn smooth with age.

Who does live here, he wonders? Who drives these sleds?

Why do they need the furs so greedily?

Ponch stops. No more questions, forget the questions, they'll only get you killed. All you must do now is keep going.

He moves into a dark cave, seeing it is actually an ancient archway, an entrance into the citadel. His breathing is hoa.r.s.e and he can feel himself settling into a familiar watchful state of awareness, almost a trance, nothing but senses and instincts. The conscious mind, far too slow, must be subdued.

The tunnel is lit, somehow. Ponch sees great rusted metal runners in the floors, tracks of some long-lost technology.

Odd skeletal structures, with hooks and chains and levers, clink in the cold breeze. Still he has seen no life, not one living creature.

He smells the familiar oily smell of the guild sleds. They are here somewhere.

And something else, an odour that is familiar to him, maddeningly familiar, just different somehow.

He follows this scent along the huge open floor of the metal wreckage. Just coming here has sentenced him to death amongst his own people. There is no going back for him. And then, there they are.

The guild sleds, like giant tracked slugs, quiet and still.

They are parked in rows over an area bigger than the Janua Foris. Instinctively, Ponch rolls behind cover, his movements echoing round the empty hangar. He knows only too well what those stubby nozzles at the front of the sleds can do. He was an idiot to come here, what the h.e.l.l was he doing listening to that stupid woman? His life was fine until she arrived. After all her words, he is going to end up shot to pieces by the sled operators.

He realises he is grasping the little idol of Janua, still round his neck on a string. The two-faced G.o.d, he who sees before and after. 'Protect me,' Ponch whispers, even as he accepts that as he has trespa.s.sed into the G.o.d's own house he can hardly expect the protection he's asking for.

Ponch lies there, behind this broken machine thing, for a long, long time. It's nice. It's safe.

He has heard nothing from the sleds, nothing at all. A trick? Perhaps, but he can't sit here for ever, can he? He has to find the answers and this is as good a place as any to begin.

That odour drifts into his nostrils again. What is it? Like an itch, it just sits there, working away at him in a place he can't reach.

So familiar, yet also so... so strange.

He risks a peep over the machine. The guild sleds are still there, just as he left them. Their skin is smooth, completely sealed, like big kidney beans. The thought makes him chuckle, until he realises the seriousness of the situation and calms himself.

The nozzles on the fronts of the sleds still protrude, but they're not twisting and waving like they do outside, hunting for prey. The sleds are empty, he decides. They have to be.

Perhaps this is his chance to get past them.

He remembers the way they roll over the fur bundles left for them by his people. The way the bundles disappear. He can't see any visible doors, so how do the operators get inside?

There must be some kind of hatchway underneath, between the runners and the tracks. As Ponch squints he calculates there is probably just enough room for him to fit under a sled. Might as well try it, better than waiting here for them to start up.

He does so. Moving, sneaking as quietly as he can, Ponch darts to the leading guild sled. He slides himself under its bulk, trying to control the rather sensible instinct to run away as fast as he can.

He shuffles underneath on his back, arms over his head, probing. There is a large metal hole leading into the sled. He grips with his fingers and pulls himself to it.

Awkwardly, and banging his head on more than one occasion, he manages to sit up, into the hole, then stand. A couple of steps up and he is inside.

Artificial lights flicker into life. Ponch flinches, expecting an a.s.sault of some kind, but it doesn't come. Instead, the interior of a guild sled is revealed to him. He is in a bare metal box, with a small opening leading to what appears to be a cramped compartment. There are no seats, just large boxes that Ponch guesses are a control system.

No one drives the sleds. They drive themselves.

How can this be? It cannot be true. Ponch is stunned by the revelation. What does that mean? Where are the operators? There is nothing in here but dormant machinery and the lingering smell of furs. There is never anything but machinery and furs in here.

Furs. The smell of furs, that is the odour he couldn't place.

It was just so concentrated, so rich, as if, as if... and already Ponch suspects what he is going to find.

He drops back out of the sled and slides his way to the rear of the machine. Then he is up and running, almost feverishly, towards the odour of leathered skins that envelops him as he races in the dark.

The ground gives way and his heart stops in its tracks as he plummets. Some kind of smooth metal chute steers him faster and faster towards the smell which becomes too strong, making him retch.

Ponch tries to grip the sides of chute but they are worn smooth with age. He yells in fright, scrabbling to escape the descent.

At last, the chute ends and he flies through the air, spinning and spiralling, his axe dropping from his hand. He hits something soft and the breath is knocked out of him.

Ponch lies there for a while in the dark, bathed in the overpowering, all-encompa.s.sing stench. Is this it? He wonders. Is this everything my life is worth?

He sits up. As he knew he would, he can see nothing but hides and skins and furs, thousands upon thousands of them, stretching out as far as he can see, the precious collections of generations of his people moulding and rotting through the years.

Ponch looks down on them. What to make of it? What to make of all this wasted work?

There isn't any guild, any operators, any Janua. There is nothing but empty ritual and wasted lives.

He looks up at the twinkling chutes over his head and bellows with laughter. 'I understand! I understand everything!'

He knows why he understands, why he feels that the final events in the palace of the Old Ones are so true to him. Why there is no other possible ending. Of course. He is such an idiot, such a child; anyone else with half a brain would have guessed it ages ago.

The story, Miranda Pelham's story, is real because it happened. He knows because he was there.

Ponch stays throughout the long, cruel winter. He uses the time to explore the remains of the citadel. What its function may once have been, he never discovers.

The only event, the only change in all the time he is here, occurs early, at the end of the autumn. Night is coming in as he stands on the battlements. The sun is a giant orange eye, sinking over the valley, sending down a shadow that is longer and longer every day. On this particular evening, he hears a mult.i.tude of clattering coughs from inside the hangar, the noisy coming to life of the guild sleds. It must be the time of the Gathering. One by one they snake out of the hangar and into the darkening valley. A line of metal beetles, on their way to their annual, mindless collection.

A week later they are back. Ponch has prepared a hiding place for himself inside their nest and watches as they drop the useless furs down the chutes, where they will rot.

A year's back-breaking labour, all he has ever known. In this life.

He wonders how many they killed for coming in below quota this time.

There is food to be found within this silent, dead s.p.a.ce: strange metal canisters that he hacks open. Also insects and beetles and, once, a large black bird that somehow made its unlucky way to him.

Ponch doesn't mind the loneliness, the cold, the hunger.

This life is a dream and it is time to wake. He is waiting for spring.

Look both ways, that's the creed of Janua, and he knows that this is what he must do.

When the snow has melted sufficiently and the orange eye peeps its way over the mountains again, he prepares a small pack of provisions and leaves the citadel behind.

The inn is still standing, though he knows it will be deserted.

He walks through last year's township; its smoking ruins are charcoal bones. No bodies, no remains of any kind that will be of use to him.

Only the Janua Foris stands intact. Not so much an inn as a shrine to the trappers' life. A life Ponch is heartily sick of.

He tries to remember the poetry he must once have written, but recalls not one single word. Just a story, that's all.

Inside the Janua Foris, a light is spilling through the gloom from one unfamiliar door in the wall. He had asked himself a thousand times how Pelham had got herself here, but all the time he was thinking of boots and sleds and snow. He should have realised she would have no need for these things.

He walks through the shining door.

The warmth is uncomfortable; he is already sweating, so he hauls off his outer layers. He won't need them any more.

The room is impossibly large. He had walked around the whole inn in the past and seen no evidence of its existence, so he must already have travelled somewhere beyond the Janua Foris.

The white walls are decorated with hangings and a vast shelf of books, nearly obscuring the roundels behind them. A gently humming block of metal, plastic and gla.s.s sits snugly in the room's centre.