Doctor Who: The Masque of the Mandragora by Philip Hinchcliffe

Author:Philip Hinchcliffe
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science-Fiction:Doctor Who
ISBN: 9781558172241
Publisher: Target Books
Published: 1989-06-01T10:00:00+00:00

9 The Invasion Begins

‘Hello, Sarah,’ said the Doctor quietly. His eyes took in the bodkin. ‘A poisoned needle?’

Sarah hesitated, her arm still raised ready to strike. Her face was like a crazed mask. The Doctor fixed her with a hypnotic stare, his clear blue eyes drilled into hers like a laser beam. ‘Drop it, Sarah.’

Hieronymous moved behind him. ‘Strike him down!’

Sarah jumped at the Doctor but as the needle flashed towards him he side-stepped and caught hold of her wrist, deflecting the blow.

‘You don’t want to harm me, Sarah,’ he ordered firmly, ‘I am your friend. Drop it.’

Sarah struggled for a few seconds, blinked and her face resumed its normal expression. Her gaze fell from the Doctor’s eyes to her hand, her fingers opened slowly, and the needle dropped to the ground.

The Doctor smiled gently and released her. As he did so Hieronymous lunged across the room, a dagger in his hand.

‘The curse of Demnos on you, forever!’

The Doctor dodged to one side. Hieronymous lunged again. This time the Doctor leant back and neatly kicked the knife out of the astrologer’s hand.

‘You’re really too old for this sort of thing, Hieronymous.’

As the knife went spinning across the floor there was a commotion in the corridor outside and soldiers poured into the room headed by Rossini.

‘Take them!’

Three of the guards leapt upon the Doctor who was near the door. He went down struggling.

‘Doctor!’ yelled Sarah and started clawing at one of the guards.

Hieronymous snatched up the mask. As the soldiers advanced on him he threw a ladle of hot liquid from the cauldron into their faces and dashed behind the curtain at the rear of the chamber. The soldiers fell back screaming and choking.

‘Fools! Stop him!’ yelled Rossini. ‘Don’t let him get away.’

But Hieronymous had gained sufficient time to elude them in the darkness of the secret passage and after a brief search the captain had to content himself with his capture of the Doctor and Sarah.

In his private chamber Giuliano was in a flurry of indecision. Sarah had inexplicably slipped out while his back was turned and he had been searching for fresh dressing for his wound.

In addition, there was no word from the Doctor and several hours had passed. He dared not go in search of them for fear of meeting up with Federico’s men who were bound to be patrolling the palace. It was pure good fortune they had not returned to search his chambers again and no doubt before the morning they would think of this.

The Prince paced the room for several minutes. Finally he reached a decision. He strapped on his sword belt, crossed to the door and slipped cautiously out into the corridor.

It was still nightfall and the palace lay strangely quiet. Most of the torches had been doused but through the open colonnade a strong moonlight cast a pale ethereal glow onto the marbled floor. For some reason the quiet cool atmosphere made him think back to his childhood, how as a little boy

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