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‘No, no, my friends,’ said the Master, ‘You must stay and help me to celebrate my future greatness. You see before you the future ruler - nay, God! - of this planet!’
‘Oh dear me, here we go again,’ sighed the Doctor, ‘You know, you really are very boring. I mean, can't you at least try to come up with something original? You know, you try too hard, that's your trouble!’
The Master ignored the Doctor's raillery - the latter knew too well that his opponent had a brilliant mind which he often found difficult to match.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
 ne of the castle guards had kindly escorted the couple to their 'room' - a dark and dank cell in the castle bowels.
‘So,’ said Jo, shivering, ‘Count Dracula was really the Master all along.’
‘I don't think so, Jo,’ the Doctor replied, ‘old Vlad's either fled, or is dead. But I'm not so much worried about him as I am about the Master has in store for this planet!’
Suddenly, the sensation of touch, made the more strange because she could see nothing at all in the darkness, took Jo by surprise. She froze. It felt like a hand...on her shoulder!
Seconds crept like hours and she longed for the Doctor's voice just to know that he was still there. She tried to scream - partly in fear, and partly to break the terrible silence - but all she managed was a tiny squeak which, at least, snapped her out of her terror-induced paralysis. Then there was a deep groan.
‘Who's there? Jo?!’ called the Doctor, leaping into the blackness and feeling for his young friend...and for whatever had made that noise.
Volta descended the narrow winding steps to the prisoners' cell, a flaming torch in his strong right hand. There was a storm threatening that night. Many of the villagers were restless, and saying that it was a warning from God and that they must at last overthrow the Master. Many of Volta's men felt the same, and how could he blame them? He could not, for they had all heard the cry of the devil that evening in the mountains. And now, on this night of celestial violence, there was to be an impaling. It was execution day, but excitement had turned to fear, for the Master had ordered the execution of...
Volta ran to the side of the guard who was lying outside the open door of the cell, sobbing and burying his hands in his hot eyes.
‘What's happened?’ asked Volta, ‘Has he escaped?’
‘Captain…’ moaned the dazed guard, ‘they all have. The tall one...he has the power of the Master...he worked the evil magic of the yes on me.’
Jo stared at their new companion: a tragic figure, lean and bent in stature, with beady green eyes, a long nose, slightly protruding teeth, and a haggard face descending to a little black tuft of bristles on his pointed chin. This was their cell-mate, hard to imagine just how this strange little man could inspire such horror and romance in the twentieth-century, some 500 years later. He was standing rather timidly at the Doctor's side. They had evaded the guards and were now in the Master's chambers.
Vlad had told the time-travellers all about how the Master had arrived a few years earlier, an angel from hell, and had taken the soldiers and villagers into his power with all kinds of magic. Now, the Doctor stood musing over some pieces of scientific equipment.
‘I had most of these as a child,’ he commented, ‘these are just scraps - the instruments of the Master's 'magic', no doubt! No...whatever that jackanapes is up to, he'll have the really important stuff in the TARDIS.’
‘Couldn't you break in?’ asked Jo, ‘I mean, I've seen you do it before.’
‘No problem,’ said the Doctor in reply, ‘but, with a fully functioning chameleon-circuit, I'm afraid the Master's TARDIS shall prove pretty difficult to find in this castle, Jo.’
Disappointed that her suggestion had not been of much help, Jo wondered over to another table and pondered over some diagrams that were lying there, as the Doctor stood brooding.
‘Doctor...?’ she called, ‘Come and look at these, I think they're star-maps.’
The Doctor, lifting a candle-holder, crossed the room to join her. As the thunder began to blast outside, Dracula, now left alone in the dark, followed hurriedly.
 
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the dragons apostle page3
