‘All of them?’ asked Amy.

‘All of them,’ the Doctor confirmed, ‘and I hope they’ll stay there for a long time.’

He looked back at Rory.

‘Rory, get your friends to go and tell the other Morphans that the crisis is over. I’ve got to have a little tete-a-tete with Lord Ixyldir here, but that should be a formality. Then well come down to Beside and find you. All right?’

‘Yes, Doctor,’ said Rory.

‘And it is safe,’ said the Doctor. ‘Lord Ixyldir won’t be doing any more attacking, will you, Lord Ixyldir?’

The Ice Lord took a moment to reply, but it was a regular Ice Warrior pause.

‘No, cold blue star,’ he replied.

The wounded Ice Warriors began to patch themselves up. Amy, Bel and Samewell tried to offer some help, but they didn’t really know enough about Martian physiology, and they were also a little freaked out to be so close to giant green aliens who had spent most of the previous day chasing them with murderous intent.

‘Why exactly should I desist from my pursuit of this planet?’ Lord Ixyldir asked the Doctor.

‘Because it’s the honourable thing to do,’ the Doctor replied. ‘You have ships. Go elsewhere.’

‘Because you won this battle for us?’ asked the Ice Lord.

‘If you like,’ the Doctor replied. ‘I suppose there’s a mark of honour to be repaid there. A matter of respect.

But before we even started this fight, I told you why you ought to leave Hereafter and the Morphans alone.’

He walked back over to the console where the Guide database flickered and cycled in a tight information swarm.

‘You’re trying to rebuild your civilisation, Ixyldir,’

he said. ‘That’s good. Ultimately, the empire of the Ice Warriors is a positive force in the universe. Except for the few occasions you put a size sixteen foot wrong, or forget to do the right thing.’

The Ice Lord did not reply.

‘Rebuild, Ixyldir,’ said the Doctor. ‘Rebuild your world, rebuild your race, rebuild your empire. Rebuild it all. But make sure you rebuild your ideals too.

Rebuild the principles that made you a great and honourable galactic power in the first place. Don’t prey on the weak. Don’t steal from the helpless. Don’t murder the innocent. Be a force for good, not a force for yourself.’

The Doctor selected some data from the Guide and pulled it up in hologram form.

‘The original Morphan pioneers did a good job of surveying this galactic neighbourhood,’ he said. ‘I’ve only made a quick study of it, but it’s very interesting.

Very interesting indeed. They picked Hereafter because it was certainly the most Earth-like world in the quadrant. It wasn’t, however, the most Mars- like. See here?’

He pointed to one of the stars on the chart. His fingertip dipped into the hologram as though he was writing on water.

‘Atrox 881. It’s about eight light years from here.

Entirely unsuitable for humans. Well within range of your ships. I happen to know, Ixyldir, that in about 9,000 years’ time, one of the most significant fiefworlds of the Ixon Mons dynasty will be located there. A quadrant capital. A famous centre of culture and power. It’ll be run by a particularly able warlord called Azylax. If I remember my Galactic Migration Eras correctly, it’s a colony that’s due to be founded any day now.’

Ixyldir studied the chart.

‘Atrox 881,’ the Ice Lord murmured. ‘From the scans, it appears to be… a cold blue star.’

‘A Belot’ssar indeed, Ixyldir,’ said the Doctor.

‘Perhaps Lord Azylax was invoking something entirely different when he gave me my nickname.

Perhaps he was remembering something that I hadn’t done yet.’

‘Will you not stay, Doctor?’ asked Bill Groan.

Many of the Morphans gathered in the comforting warmth of the assembly raised their voices in hearty encouragement.

‘We’d love to,’ said the Doctor, glancing at Amy and Rory beside him. ‘But… miles to go before we sleep, and all that.’

‘We’ve got a long journey ahead of us,’ said Rory.

‘But you came all this way to well-wish us for the festival,’ said Vesta. ‘All the way from your plantnation. Wherever that is.’

‘I think we’ve well-wished you more than enough already,’ said the Doctor. ‘You need some time to tidy up. You’ve got rebuilding to do, Elect. Some people have lost loved ones. You’ve come through a crisis and survived, but there’s a hard winter ahead. Several, in fact. The Firmers are stabilised, but it will take a few more years before they start to ease the climate back out of ice-age mode. So card wool. Knit. Collect plenty of firewood. You’ll do fine, though. You always have.

A bit of hard work, and you’ll get through it. I know you’re not afraid of hard work.’

He looked at the faces watching him in the solamp light.

‘Celebrate your survival,’ he said. ‘And keep celebrating it. The elders of this plantnation, Bill and Winnowner, and the others, they know they have a fine new generation to pass the torch to when the time comes.’

Bel got to her feet. She was sitting in the front row between Samewell and Vesta.

‘It is traditional for us to give gifts to well-wishers at the festival,’ she said. ‘We have not much this year, not with everything that has happened. But we wanted you to have this back at least.’

She handed the Doctor his wallet of psychic paper.

‘Excellent choice,’ he said. ‘I always like to have some around. I have a gift for you too. For all the Morphans, actually.’

He looked at them.

‘I took the liberty,’ he said, ‘of slightly resetting your Guide. Don’t worry, Winnowner, I haven’t fiddled with it. I’ve just tidied up the user interface so you can all access it. You’ll find it easy to use. Just ask it questions. It has all sorts of information in it. It’ll help you a great deal. It should make your life here, and the development of your colony, a little easier. It’ll help you build and improve.’

He paused for a moment. Not quite an Ice Warrior pause, but a pause nevertheless.

‘I also,’ he said, ‘reset the parameters of the hibernetic systems. The patients are sleeping. And they will sleep for as long as you want them to. When the time comes, when Hereafter is ready, you can decide whether to wake them up or not.’

‘If it was up to me,’ said Rory, ‘I’d let them sleep for ever.’

‘If it was up to me,’ said Amy, ‘I’d pull the plug.’

‘It’s not up to either of you,’ said the Doctor. ‘It’s up to the Morphans. They might decide it’s cruel to leave their kin sleeping. They might think it’s kinder to let them dream out eternity. The important thing is, if you do decide to wake them, it will be on your terms. You will have total control. They can’t wake up repurposed and armed to the teeth like this time. You can revive them, and you can show them how the new world works, and what their part in it can be.’

He shrugged.

‘It’s not much of a present, I know,’ he said, ‘but the shops were shut.’

Chapter

18

Above Thy Deep

and Dreamless Sleep

It was about an hour before dawn. Guide’s Bell would soon be ringing. The sky was almost mauve, and the stars were all out. The ghostly snow-cover was perfect for as far as the eye could see. The only blemish on the scene was the thin smoke rising from the fires that had burned out in the high woods. But Would Be would grow back in time. It would be a wood again.

At the top of the valley, the three of them stopped and turned to look back at the little town in the valley below. Its lamps twinkled in the cold air.

‘It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas,’ said Rory.

‘Really? Christmas-like?’ asked Amy.

‘Christmas -esque,’ said the Doctor.

They trudged up the slope to where the TARDIS

was still patiently leaning.