Not all of Madman's power, even focussed through his new-found will, could undo Lilith; but it did diminish her. She wavered, uncertain for the first time. Her power clashed with his, as he strove to drive her away, and she struggled to remain. For a long moment the stalemate held; and then I used the last of my power to find the door through which she'd entered Strangefellows, and pushed her back through it.

She disappeared, but her voice whispered a last message in my mind.

I'll see you again, John. My son, in whom I am well pleased. We have such marvellous work ahead of us.

It was very quiet in the bar, after that. Lilith was gone, as were Merlin and Sinner and Pretty Poison. And poor Suzie Shooter, damned to the awful future I had made for her. Most of Walker's people were dead or gone, or stripped of their magics. Madman lay curled up on the floor in front of the bar, sleeping soundly. Walker strolled over to look down at him.

"It's always the ones you overlook who turn out to be the most bother," he said mildly. "I wonder what he'll be like, when he wakes up?"

"Sane, hopefully," I said. "I think that last effort used up all of his power, and his madness. Maybe now he'll be able to forget what he Saw and live in the same reality as the rest of us."

"You always were an optimist, John," said Walker. "I'm not allowed that luxury." He looked at me for a long moment, his eyes very cold. "You no longer have any friends in the Nightside. You are a danger to everyone and to everything here. We are all your enemies now."

"You don't know the half of it," I said.

Walker nodded slowly, then tipped his bowler hat to me, gathered up his remaining people with his eyes, and led them back up the metal stairway and out of the bar. They took Pew's body with them. Alex came out from behind his bar to blow a rude noise after them and look mournfully round at the scattered wreckage of his chairs and tables. He sighed heavily.

"I'll have to call the Coltranes back to clear this mess up. And I hate having to pay after-hours triple time. What are you going to do now, John?"

"I am going to the Tower of Time," I said. "I'm going back in Time, to search through the earlier incarnations of the Nightside, and dig up people or Beings or Forces who can tell me what I need to know. How to stop my mother Lilith. Because I will use any weapon, any knowledge, to prevent the future she intends to bring about."

Alex sniffed, unconvinced. "Do you think what we saw was really Suzie?"

"Some possible future version, perhaps. But I'll never let that happen to her. I won't let her be hurt by anyone. Even me."

"At least now we know who your mother really is," said Alex. "Lilith. Who would have thought it?"