Chapter 50: Duty-bound

‘You have to tell me about Rollo Price,’ I repeated. David Tennant still said nothing. ‘I’ve asked over and again, and the Teacher, and every time, you tell me not to worry, and Miss Smallbone has told the others that there’s nothing to worry about, but the time is coming and Rollo is part of it, and I don’t know what part. I need to understand what he’s doing in my story.’

‘I can imagine that,’ said David. ‘If I were in your position, it’s something that I would really want to know.’ And then he stopped.

‘Nice try!’ I said. ‘The Teacher tried to turn me against him, and now she says I don’t have to worry about him, but she gives me no reason, and neither do you. It’s ridiculous. It’s like he’s this shadowy figure in the background, obviously important, but no one’s ever bothered to explain him properly.’

David Tennant picked up the Evening Standard I’d brought in with me, and folded it so the only thing showing was the main headline: BARMY BORIS SLAMS FRANCE-RUSSIA PACT. HOUSE PRICE CRASH AHEAD? He wasn’t looking at it, just fiddling. He smoothed the paper, and I watched his hands, wanting to hold them. I had some faint memory about prisoners not getting nail scissors because they might turn them into those knives made out of toothbrushes (I’ve never been clear on the details) but David was perfectly neat. Eventually, he tapped his right knuckles twice gently on the table and asked me, ‘What do you know about the Unattached?’ Nothing. ‘I thought so. After our people were cast upon this planet in the giant explosion that killed the dinosaurs, etc., we divided more or less down the middle, and we have fought ever since. The angels try to save the earth, the demons seek to destroy it. But there were some who refused to pick sides, and over the millennia, others have joined them. They are the Unattached. We do not know precisely who or how many they are, a few score perhaps. Some of them, concentrating on very long-term investments, are incredibly wealthy and powerful; some are more monastic; some have gone what you might call crazy – like missionaries left too long alone. The Teacher is certain that at least some of the Unattached collaborate to maintain the status quo. They are, therefore, loosely on the side of the angels. Rollo is a part of your story, very clearly. The Master has watched him because he has been around you too often for it to be a coincidence. Perhaps the simplest reading of the Rollo situation is that he is one of the Unattached who has assigned himself to you as a Guardian, or been assigned. If he were an assassin, you would be long dead.’

‘How could he have found out about me?’

‘The Unattached have great resources, as I said.’

‘Could he have told the Master? Is that how the Master found me?’

‘I doubt it. The Unattached have joined us several times, but they have never fought on the side of the demons. They are like Switzerland. They engage only to protect themselves, and if the fate of the world is in the balance, they would join those trying to save it. Almost certainly.’

‘You are telling me half truths.’

David grinned and said, ‘You’re beautiful when you’re angry, and you learn very fast, but know this, I have told you nothing untrue.’ And he leaned forward, folded my hands in his, and said, ‘I would do anything to protect you. Anything. I…’ He exhaled. ‘I look forward to the end. You understand that I must do what the Teacher thinks is best? She has always done the right thing. It is very hard to be a leader. She loves you very much, Mary Sue. And she loves this planet very much. It’s been her whole life.’
***

I knew he thought he was doing the right thing, but I had had enough. Without another word I strode from the interview room to where I knew Rollo would be standing like a woolly-suited sentinel. I grabbed him by the arm and said, ‘Enough, Rollo. I’ve been told not to have this conversation, and I think you have too, but we’re going to have it. Come with me.’

Half an hour later, in a greasy spoon round the corner from the station, Rollo looked at me with his disconcerting eyes and said, ‘Ok. What do you want to know? I’ll tell you anything.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Tricky. May I start by saying that I’m here to protect you? That’s my job. I’m…’

‘No, Rollo. That’s all the Teacher ever says, and David Tennant, and then it’s just guff about Unattacheds, complications and prophecies no one understands. You need to tell me something that I can get to grips with, because at the moment, I don’t trust you, and I’m finding it increasingly difficult to trust anyone. You are the key to this whole story in some mysterious way, and I need to know how.’

‘The Teacher told you I was an Unattached?’ he asked.

‘Don’t!’ I said. ‘Don’t repeat what they say. I want to know the truth.’

‘No you don’t. What you want is to look into my eyes, and to know for certain that you can trust me.’

‘No, I don’t. I want to…’

‘This is me, Mary Sue. No one knows you better than I do. Look into my eyes.’ He said it with such, I don’t know exactly, but depth might be part of how to explain it, that I instantly locked my eyes on his, and I looked through him almost, and I knew I would trust him with my life, absolutely, without any question.

I worry that I’ve made him sound creepy, like some circus mesmerist, but I can’t help that because I have never been very good at describing. Believe me when I say that I had, from that moment on, no doubt that Rollo would do anything to protect me. I said, ‘I trust you,’ and he squeezed my hand, and it was not like when David Tennant squeezed it. I didn’t feel any confusion – I just knew he was the best friend I’d ever have. I know I’ve said this badly. I really do know it. You’ll be thinking, ‘How could she possibly trust him after THIS. He has said literally NOTHING that I would regard as trustworthy!’ All I can say is that you didn’t look in his eyes, so you don’t understand. Those were eyes that loved me, absolutely, without exception, without consideration of time or pain. I bet no one has ever looked at you like that.