Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow: Nevermoor 3

by Jessica Townsend

  The Mayhew Street they’d left just seconds earlier had been bright and sunny, and swelteringly hot, full of people enjoying the summer day. This Mayhew Street was as cool and crisp as an autumn evening, twilight-dim, and empty of life. There was no traffic. No sound at all.

  ‘Did I just … black out, or something?’ Morrigan asked Hawthorne and Mahir. But they were as confused as she was.

  ‘Come on,’ called Miss Cheery. She was already halfway back down the steps they’d just come up, heading for the street. A little dazed, but still determined to find something interesting, Morrigan ran to catch up with her conductor.

  In the middle of Mayhew Street, where she knew there ought to have been a row of cherry trees, there was instead a large wooden desk with a sign across the front that said ‘LOANS’. A primly dressed, bespectacled young woman with a gold W pin on her collar stood behind it, watching the group as they approached. She didn’t look very pleased to see them.

  ‘There she is!’ shouted Miss Cheery, running over and enveloping her in a big, enthusiastic hug. ‘My friend, Roshni Singh: youngest librarian in Gobleian history. You did it, girl. I’m proud of you.’

  As they embraced, the librarian stared in dismay over Miss Cheery’s shoulder at Unit 919. ‘Um, Maz … you never said you were bringing an entourage,’ she said. ‘What are all these kids doing here?’

  Miss Cheery looked back at Morrigan and the unit. ‘Who, this lot? They’ve come to worship at the altar of knowledge.’

  ‘Marina,’ said the librarian seriously. ‘None of them is old enough to have a library card here.’

  ‘But I’ve got one,’ said Miss Cheery. She beamed and held up the thin metal card hanging around her neck on a chain.

  ‘Marina,’ Roshni said again, folding her arms and looking sternly over her spectacles. ‘The Gobleian Library is no place for children.’

  Morrigan heard Hawthorne whisper a jubilant ‘Yesssss’, and even Thaddea perked up a little.

  But Miss Cheery clicked her tongue and gave an unruffled shrug. ‘Okay, but see … your scary librarian face doesn’t scare me, Rosh, ’cos I’ve seen you practise it in the mirror about a thousand times. Listen, they’ll be good, I promise. Right, 919?’ She looked at them pointedly, and they all nodded (with wildly varying levels of enthusiasm).

  Roshni shook her head despairingly, the ends of her shiny black bob brushing against her shoulders. She lowered her voice. ‘Maz, you’re gonna get me in trouble. It’s only my first week as a full librarian and you’re asking me to break the most important rule there is.’

  ‘No! Not break,’ said Miss Cheery. ‘Just … bend? Slightly?’

  ‘No. I won’t do it.’

  ‘Oh, go on,’ Miss Cheery cajoled, turning on the full wattage of her winning smile. ‘You used to let me in all the time when you were a bookfighter, even when I didn’t have a library card. After closing time and all.’ She raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Shhhh.’ Roshni blinked repeatedly, looking scandalised as she glanced around to see if anyone had heard, but the street was empty. She grabbed Miss Cheery’s arm and pulled her away from the loans desk, speaking in a harsh whisper. Morrigan strained to hear, while trying not to look as if she was straining to hear. ‘Marina, I’m not just a bookfighter now. I’m a librarian. I’ve got my own beat. I can’t keep bending the rules for you, Maz. We’re not kids any more.’ She pulled at her sleeve. ‘I wear a cardigan, for goodness’ sake.’

  Miss Cheery tugged at the bright yellow sleeve too. ‘Suits you, that cardigan,’ she said in a low voice. ‘The glasses, too. They’re well academic.’

  Roshni tried not to smile, but she was clearly pleased. ‘I had to wear contacts when I was a bookfighter or else they’d get stolen by a monkey or blown off by a tornado or something.’

  Morrigan, still trying to look as if she wasn’t eavesdropping, was torn between amusement and alarm at this comment. Blown off by a tornado … ?

  Miss Cheery nudged Roshni’s arm, and the librarian finally smiled. ‘Come on, Rosh. One hour. The kids’ll love it. I’ve been bragging about you. They just want to see where you work, that’s all.’

  Roshni peered around Miss Cheery at Unit 919, who were standing still and silent as instructed, and trying to look like obedient, well-behaved children.

  The librarian sighed. ‘Fine. ONE hour.’

  Miss Cheery punched the air. ‘Yes! I knew you’d come through, Roshni Singh, that’s why you’re my best girl in all the Seven Pockets.’

  ‘All right, listen up,’ said the young librarian, hiding a smile as she turned back to Morrigan and the others. She pushed up the sleeves of her yellow cardigan, adjusted her spectacles and placed her hands on her hips. ‘Welcome to the Gobleian Library, yeah? I cannot stress this enough: it is extremely dangerous in here. You must be vigilant at all times. You must stay with the group at all times. You must pay attention, and listen to my instructions, and the instructions of my bookfighters. If we tell you to run, you run. If we tell you to drop to the ground, you drop to the ground. If we tell you not to pat the bunny in the waistcoat, then trust me – you do NOT want to pat the bunny in the waistcoat.’ She paused, looking around at them impressively, her eyes owlishly large behind the thick glass of her specs. ‘Because he has rabies.’

  Miss Cheery cleared her throat. ‘Rosh,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Okay, fine. He doesn’t have rabies,’ Roshni admitted. ‘But he could have rabies. Or he could have a truncheon. You wouldn’t know. So do as I say, understand?’

  ‘Yes,’ mumbled Unit 919.

  ‘I SAID,’ she shouted, ‘DO YOU UNDERSTAND?’

  ‘YES!’ they shouted in return.

  Roshni stepped behind the loans desk and took out a heavy-duty utility belt bearing some surprising items – a pair of handcuffs, a large knife, a silver whistle, a radio, a roll of masking tape, several chocolate bars, a leather whip and a ring full of keys. She fastened it around her hips.

  ‘Right. Leave any brollies and bags here. Let’s go get some wheels.’

  The Gobleian Library wasn’t just a library.

  The Gobleian Library was another realm.

  ‘A pocket realm, technically. Attached to the side of our own, like a weird growth,’ whispered Miss Cheery, beckoning Unit 919 to lean in closer. They were gliding silently through the library’s version of Old Town in the back of a coach enclosed entirely by thick, pale green riverglass. Roshni had told them it was mined from the bed of the River Juro, and that it was the strongest and most durable material readily available in Nevermoor. Morrigan thought it was rather like being inside the waterfall skyscraper of Cascade Towers, or at the bottom of the sea. Everything outside the coach was bathed in an ethereal green glow. Miss Cheery continued in a low murmur, ‘An accidental duplicate of Nevermoor. Exactly the same, but … well, a bit different. It popped into existence around thirteen Ages ago. Nobody really knows why or how. The League of Explorers thought one of their people had messed around with the gateways and made it by mistake, but nobody ever put their hand up to take responsibility. Eventually City Hall took control and these really rich people called Lord and Lady Gobbleface bought it—’

  ‘You know their surname is Gob-le-Fasse,’ Roshni protested wearily from the driver’s seat.

  ‘—and the Gobblefaces turned it into … this,’ Miss Cheery finished with a vague wave around them.

  ‘This’ was perhaps the most extraordinary thing Morrigan had ever seen. And that was saying something, because in her two-and-a-bit years since coming to Nevermoor, she’d seen some extraordinary things.

  This was Nevermoor, but not. The streets were just the same. Courage Square was there, with its golden fish-statue fountain in the middle. All the buildings were the same, and the street signs and gaslights and benches. Even the post boxes were plotted out exactly as they were in the normal Nevermoor.

  But the square was empty of people. The streets and buildings were eerily silent. The fountain had no water in it. The trees ha
d no birdsong, no leaves moving gently in the breeze. There was no breeze. The air was still and cool. The sky still hadn’t changed from that dusky grey-blue.

  And instead of people, birds and breeze … the library-city was filled with books.

  Well, naturally. Morrigan had expected it to be filled with books. What she hadn’t expected was to find the streets populated by endless rows and rows and rows of shelves reaching almost as high as some of the buildings, stacked with millions – maybe billions – of books, as far as the eye could see.

  ‘It’s always nearly night,’ explained Roshni. ‘And it’s always a bit nippy. We’re not sure why; probably that’s what the real Nevermoor was like in the moment when this duplicate popped up. It’s not a real realm, you see – it’s just a very good reproduction of the city. Lucky for us about the weather though, and the time of day – if it was sunny, the book covers would fade. Never rains, either. And the cool temperature goes a long way to helping control the inhabitants.’ She shrugged. ‘Most of them, anyway.’

  Morrigan put her hand up. ‘Excuse me, but … what do you mean, inhabitants?’ She peered through the green glass. They’d travelled blocks and blocks but hadn’t passed a single living soul.

  ‘The inhabitants of the books,’ Roshni said simply, as she brought the coach to a halt. ‘Sometimes they get out. But don’t worry, that’s what bookfighters are for. To round up the rogues and – ah, here we are. The Nevermoorian History section, part of my beat: Reference, General Non-Fiction and Special Collections.’

  Miss Cheery followed Roshni out of the coach, but the scholars of Unit 919 didn’t move. Morrigan wondered if she looked as horrified as the others. She certainly felt it.

  Arch was the first to speak. ‘Sorry, did she just say—’

  ‘Sometimes they get out?’ finished Anah, her bottom lip quivering.

  ‘What did she mean by “the inhabitants of the books”?’ asked Cadence.

  ‘She was joking, wasn’t she?’ said Hawthorne. He looked directly at Morrigan, who didn’t have an answer for him.

  ‘Come on, you lot!’ came Miss Cheery’s voice, and they all clambered reluctantly out of the coach.

  Morrigan could almost forget they were outside. The rows of tall shelving made everything feel closed in, as quiet and serious as the Jackalfax Public Library, which she had visited once or twice back in the Republic.

  But this was so much vaster than the library in Jackalfax. Morrigan looked left and right along shelves that seemed to go on forever in both directions, lining every street and alley and dotted with enormous wheeled ladders. Every fifteen metres or so, a gas lamp made of riverglass was hung on a hook protruding from the shelves, providing a small amount of greenish illumination. She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it, but occasionally Morrigan thought she saw something dart through one of the puddles of light, or flit from one ladder to the next.

  ‘You can go have a look around,’ Roshni instructed Unit 919, who had instinctively gathered in a tight knot, intimidated by their surroundings, ‘but don’t stray too far from the coach. Be mindful if you open any books. Don’t crack the spines, don’t dog-ear the pages, don’t hold them open to one page for too long, always shut them and shelve them in their proper spot when you’re finished, and shout my name if anything jumps out at you. If something really dangerous shows up, I want you all back here and into the coach immediately. Riverglass will protect you from most inhabitants.’

  ‘Is it true the Gobleian Library has the only known copy of Fitherendian’s Compendium?’ The question burst out of Mahir as if it couldn’t wait a second longer.

  Roshni eyed him appraisingly. ‘Elvish culture buff?’

  ‘Linguist.’

  ‘Ah! Well it is true, but I’m afraid you won’t be seeing it today; rare books are over in Swordsworth. Plenty here in Old Town to interest a linguist, though! On Cordelia Street you’ll find all eighty-seven volumes of The Odyssey of Goyathlay the Wakeful, printed in the original Old Draconian.’

  Mahir clutched his chest, making a very high-pitched sound of what Morrigan assumed was happiness.

  ‘Go on now, have a wander,’ said Roshni. ‘Listen for my whistle, that’s your signal to meet back here.’

  The scholars peeled off in groups of two or three, but Morrigan stayed hovering around Roshni and Miss Cheery. She needed to talk to the librarian.

  ‘What about a visit to Lilith Gate?’ Miss Cheery was asking her friend.

  Roshni gave her a look of exasperation. ‘Lilith Gate? Are you mad? You want me to take a bunch of children into Lilith Gate?’

  ‘Well … it is the children’s section.’

  ‘Which makes it the most dangerous part of the library, Maz, you know that. It’s riddled with dinosaurs and evil sorcerers.’

  Morrigan’s eyes widened.

  ‘And puppies,’ protested Miss Cheery. ‘And picnics! Remember that lovely picnic we had with Little Miss Muffet?’

  ‘Yeah, I also remember the spider who came to sit down beside her. It was the size of a dog, Marina.’

  Morrigan cleared her throat timidly. ‘Excuse me, er … Miss Singh. Is it true that there are sections of the library just for members of the Wundrous Society?’

  The librarian turned to her in surprise. ‘Oh! Still here? There are a few private Wunsoc collections in the Gob, so it depends which one you’re after. If you want the School of Arcane Arts collection I’m afraid it’s down in Eldritch, but the Mundane is only a block from here.’

  Morrigan felt her heart skip. ‘There are … private Mundane and Arcane Arts collections?’

  ‘Of course. Although they shouldn’t be, if you ask me,’ she added. ‘Private, I mean. We’re a library, not a country club – our collections should be available to all, Wuns and Unwuns alike. But what do I know? I just work here.’

  Morrigan strongly agreed. Even the words ‘Wun’ (for a member of the Wundrous Society) and ‘Unwun’ (a non-Society member, i.e. everyone else) sounded stupid to her, and not particularly friendly.

  ‘Is there something specific you’re looking for?’ Roshni asked her.

  What she wanted to ask, of course, was if there was also a Wundrous Arts collection … but of course she couldn’t.

  ‘Oh, just … something about … um, the history of Wunsoc,’ she mumbled. It was a feeble lie, but Roshni perked up a little, looking pleased.

  ‘A fellow historian! I think there are a few volumes that might interest you on the corner of Fitzgerald and Phelps – come on, I’ll take you there. Marina, keep an eye on your scholars, will you? That curly-headed boy looks like a right little shelf-climber.’

  Morrigan followed Roshni through several rows of towering shelves, from one pool of green light to the next.

  ‘You know, I think we might have the new edition of Inside Proudfoot—’

  The librarian was interrupted by a buzzing, crackling sound from the small silver radio mounted on her belt, followed by a static-drowned voice.

  ‘Librarian Singh, this is Librarian Feathers. Do you copy?’

  Roshni picked up the mouthpiece and pressed a little button on the side. ‘Copy, Colin. What’s up?’

  Crackle, crackle, buzz. ‘Mate, we’ve had a situation here in Lilith Gate.’ It sounded like he was trying to catch his breath. ‘That infestation from last week came back. We’ve driven them off but I’m afraid now it looks like they’re headed south. They might be coming your way. Just a heads-up.’

  Roshni groaned. ‘Copy that, Colin. Contact Dispatch and see if they can spare a crew to send into Old Town. My lot are busy in the Military History section – The Battle of Buckthorn Glen busted out of its cover yesterday, they’re still cleaning up. I’m here in the Nevermoorian History section with … some guests.’

  Buzz, crackle. ‘Copy, Rosh. I’ll let them know.’

  ‘Infestation?’ asked Morrigan. Just the word infestation made her feel itchy. Infestation of what?

  ‘Nothing to worry about.’ Roshni touched each
of the items on her belt in turn, as if checking they were still there.

  Morrigan frowned. ‘Maybe we should go back?’

  ‘It’s really nothing,’ Roshni assured her with a smile. ‘Look, here we are – Wundrous Society History. Listen, will you be okay to find what you’re looking for? I should just go back to the coach and … check on things,’ she finished vaguely.

  Morrigan nodded and made her way down the shelf, trailing a finger along the spines of such books as Inside Proudfoot House and From Aaron Ashby to Zola Zimmerman: A History of Great Wundrous Society Elders and Their Achievements.

  Now that she was alone the library was eerily quiet, but every now and then she thought she heard something. A rustling of pages. The creaking of a spine, the soft dull thud of a book cover closing. And other things, sounds she couldn’t quite explain, like the cry of distant whale song, or snatches of old-fashioned music and clinking glasses.

  As Morrigan neared the end of a row, something caught her eye at the narrow mouth of a side street. A small sign fixed to the brick wall read:

  DEVILISH COURT

  BEWARE!

  BY ORDER OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL ODDITIES SQUADRON

  AND THE NEVERMOOR COUNCIL,

  THIS STREET HAS BEEN DECLARED A

  RED ALERT TRICKSY LANE

  (HIGH-DANGER TRICKERY AND LIKELIHOOD OF DAMAGE TO PERSON ON ENTRY)

  ENTER AT OWN RISK

  With a tiny jolt, Morrigan suddenly realised which part of Old Town she was in. Devilish Court. This was the Tricksy Lane she’d discovered by accident last year! The one that turned out to be hiding the Ghastly Market.

  But there was something different here, something that hadn’t been there in the real Devilish Court … or at least, she hadn’t noticed it. Inlaid on the brickwork beneath the sign was a tiny golden circle. Morrigan stepped closer and it began to glow, pulsing in time with her quickening heartbeat. The imprint on her finger tingled.

  Had the circle started glowing for her? Like it sensed she had permission to enter and was inviting her inside?