The Crooked Sixpence

by Jennifer Bell

  Ivy froze. ‘London?!’ She tried to process that. Bletchy Scrubb was six hours’ drive from London, so how had they come all that way in a . . .

  ‘The suitcase,’ she asked. ‘How does it work?’

  Valian’s shoulders tensed. ‘I can’t tell you here. There might be an Ug waiting round the next corner. Follow me.’

  They continued in silence for another ten minutes, snaking through a labyrinth of – as far as Ivy could tell – identical tunnels. She stumbled along, her mind full of questions. Eventually Valian stopped at an intersection of three passageways. He checked that they were clear before speaking. ‘There’s only time to explain it once, so you’d better keep up.’ He pointed to one of the glass lights. ‘Do you recognize this?’

  Ivy stared hard at the object. It was about the size of a side plate, glowing with cool yellow light. There was a conical bit sticking up in the middle and a grooved lip around the edge. At first she couldn’t identify it, but then she realized that if you took it off the wall and turned it on its back, it would look a lot like . . .

  ‘A lemon squeezer,’ she said, surprising herself. ‘We have one in our kitchen at home.’

  Valian pointed to the ceiling. ‘And that?’

  Ivy tipped her head back and gasped. Hanging from the roof of the tunnel by a short length of chain was a metal colander, the kind used to drain spaghetti. Silvery wisps of smoke leaked out of the holes and then dissolved into the air.

  ‘Colander?’

  Valian nodded. ‘It filters the air down here so that we can breathe. The lemon squeezers give out light. They’re a bit like lamps, except better for the environment – and no electricity bills.’

  ‘They . . . what?’ Ivy shook her head, resting a hand against the wall. ‘How is that possible? The ones at home can’t do that.’

  Valian shrugged. ‘That’s because the ones at home are all common. The lemon squeezer and the colander here . . . They’re both uncommon.’

  Uncommon. The word struck a chord in Ivy’s mind. The underguard who’d arrested Seb had mentioned that his paperclip was uncommon . . .

  She looked down. ‘Right . . .’ she mumbled, trying to follow Valian’s explanation. ‘So if an object’s uncommon, it means it can do something amazing. But how? Is it, like . . . magic?’

  ‘Magic?’ Valian gave a wry smile. ‘Hate to ruin your fairy tale, kid, but magic doesn’t exist.’

  Ivy felt her cheeks flush. After everything she’d seen that morning, it wasn’t that stupid a suggestion. ‘OK, well then, what makes uncommon objects special? How can you tell the difference between that lemon squeezer on the wall and the one I have at home?’ She swallowed as she watched the clean yellow light coming from its centre. ‘I mean, apart from the fact that it’s glowing.’

  ‘For most of us, that’s the only way you can tell,’ Valian said. ‘There are some people who can . . . Well, that’s not important. As for what makes them special,’ he continued, ‘let me ask you a question: what’s the most powerful force in the world, the most incredible and extraordinary thing in existence?’

  Ivy frowned. She was no good at riddles and she certainly didn’t have the patience for them right now. ‘I don’t know.’

  Valian’s dark eyes glittered. ‘Us,’ he said. ‘We are. Most of the time we die and go on to the next world, right? No problem. But sometimes we don’t go on, we get stuck; or rather part of us – the soul, the spirit, the eternal bit, whatever you wanna call it – gets stuck . . . in an object.’

  The hairs on the back of Ivy’s neck stood on end. ‘WHAT?’

  ‘Shh,’ Valian whispered. ‘Keep your voice down.’ He glanced nervously down each of the three tunnels, then rummaged around inside his leather jacket. Eventually he retrieved a tattered roll of paper and opened it out in front of her. ‘There’s more. Here – read this.’

  Ivy’s heart was racing now. She could feel pressure building behind her temples again as she looked down at the piece of paper.

  NOTICE OF THE PROCLAMATION OF

  THE UNDERMART OF LUNDINOR

  At 12 midday following the day on which it is announced by the four Quartermasters of the Undermart:

  All manner of uncommoners, alive or dead, may take notice that in the Great Cavern of Blackheath under the Olde City of London, and the passages, caves and chambers adjoining is now to be held an undermart for Christmas Day and the twelve days following, to which all traders may freely resort to buy and sell according to the Liberties and Privileges of the Great Uncommon Trade (GUT).

  The notice was signed at the bottom in swirly handwriting: Mr Punch, Quartermaster of the Great Cavern, Guardian of Lundinor.

  Ivy raised her eyes slowly. The pain in her head was getting worse. ‘This doesn’t help. I’ve never even heard half of these words before. What does undermart mean?’

  Valian rolled up the notice and stuffed it back into his jacket. ‘Undermarts are markets that only sell uncommon objects. There’s one in the caves down here, called Lundinor. We’re sent these notices the day before they open for trade.’

  Ivy blinked. ‘A market?’ She didn’t know what she was expecting, but it wasn’t that.

  ‘Classic mucker reaction,’ Valian muttered, smiling.

  ‘You keep calling me that,’ Ivy complained. ‘I don’t even know what it means.’

  ‘The people who are welcome in undermarts are called uncommoners,’ Valian explained; he sounded bored. ‘Everyone else is a commoner, or mucker for short because of that saying common as—’

  ‘Muck?’ Ivy guessed. ‘How nice.’

  His face darkened. ‘Yeah, well, uncommoners don’t like outsiders. You can’t just join the Trade. You inherit the right to be an uncommoner through your bloodline. If your parents were uncommoners, then you will be too. There’s no other way in, and that’s the way uncommoners like it.’

  Ivy was puzzled as to why Valian kept describing uncommoners as if he wasn’t one of them. If it runs through the family, she thought, then his parents must have been uncommoners too. He’s not exactly an outsider.

  ‘Muckers are banned from undermarts,’ he continued. ‘And if an uncommoner reveals anything about the Great Uncommon Trade to a mucker’ – he ran a finger across his throat – ‘the underguards get cranky.’

  Ivy looked at him. It was obvious that he was risking his life by explaining all this to her, just so that she would retrieve something for him. She wondered, with a cold feeling of unease, what could possibly be that important.

  All of a sudden something bright yellow and squealing came streaking down the tunnel towards them.

  ‘Mind out the way!’ called a shrill voice. ‘Coming through!’ A woman in a fluorescent workman’s vest and knee breeches was riding something – Ivy squinted: was that a doormat? – like it was a skateboard, except that it didn’t have any wheels and just hovered in mid-air. Valian dodged nimbly aside, but Ivy had to launch herself against the wall.

  ‘Sorreeeee!!’ the lady called as she zoomed past. ‘I’ve just bought it! Haven’t learned how to use the brakes yet!’ Her voice followed her down the tunnel and out of sight.

  Ivy winced as she straightened. Valian pulled up his collar and rolled his eyes. ‘We need to go – now.’

  Minutes later, they came to a stop in front of a mountain of rucksacks, all piled on top of each other like rocks after a landslide.

  ‘Damn it.’ Valian bent forward, picked up a bag and chucked it behind him, where it landed with a soft thud. ‘Well?’ he asked Ivy. ‘Are you going to help? We need to get through these.’

  She tentatively grasped the looped handle of the nearest rucksack. As her hand closed around it, a soothing wave of heat rolled up her arm like a warm breeze. She concentrated as she held on, trying not to let Valian see her reaction. She didn’t need to be a genius to understand what was going on. Every time she touched something uncommon – whether it was the silver coin, Valian’s suitcase, or any of the bags down there – she could feel that they were
different.

  The more she thought about it, the more uncomfortable she felt. It couldn’t have been happening to the others; Seb hadn’t mentioned anything about it after he came through the suitcase, and Valian didn’t react when he picked something up.

  So what was different about her?

  ‘Don’t be fooled by the huge number of bags down here,’ Valian said after a few minutes. He heaved aside a heavy sack. ‘Uncommon objects are still rarer than moon rock. A common person could go their whole life and never come across one. Uncommoners use special methods to find them. That’s why Lundinor only opens three times a year; everyone spends the rest of the time getting hold of something worth trading. Right now we’re in the middle of the winter trading season – that’s when Lundinor opens, from Christmas Day till Twelfth Night.’

  Ivy struggled for words; there was too much to say. The more Valian explained, the more frighteningly real Lundinor became. ‘This whole thing is insane,’ she said finally, dropping a bag on the floor. ‘You know that, right? How come no one knows about this? Think of all the amazing things people could achieve using uncommon stuff. You could probably save lives.’

  ‘Or end them.’ Valian snatched at another handle. ‘Part of the reason uncommoners keep the Trade secret is to prevent uncommon objects from getting into the wrong hands. There’s a whole guild of traders whose job it is to conceal the uncommon world from muckers, just to protect them.’

  He shoved a few more bags out of the way and then looked up at the shrinking pile. Behind it was a dark, square hole in the wall. A selection of leather belts hung from a row of hooks beside it. ‘Elevation shaft,’ Valian explained, pointing. ‘No one uses it much any more. It’ll be the safest way for you to travel.’

  As Ivy considered the dark hole, her mind returned to her brother. She pieced together what Valian had told her. If, as a mucker, she was banned from undermarts, it was going to be harder than she thought to get Seb back. ‘The underguards . . .’ she said. ‘They’re like your police, right?’

  Valian lugged a heavy canvas backpack out of the way. ‘They’re meant to be.’

  Ivy pictured Officer Smokehart with his – she now guessed – uncommon toilet brush, and hoped Seb was all right. She reached down for the strap of one last rucksack; it was making a funny chattering sound. When she bent closer, she spotted something tied to it – a tortoiseshell comb.

  ‘Careful!’ Valian yelled. He grabbed the bottom of the bag and threw it onto his pile. As it hit the other bags, it made a strange clicking sound before falling silent.

  Ivy stared at it. ‘What the—?’

  Valian reached into his jacket pocket and brought out his comb again. ‘Remember this?’ He stroked it gently, and in a startling instant the plastic teeth transformed into real gnashing canines and incisors, set into brown plastic gums.

  Ivy shrank away, aghast.

  Valian shrugged. ‘It’s an anti-pickpocket device.’ He stroked the comb in the other direction and then tucked it back into his pocket. ‘Objects have different uses when they turn uncommon,’ he said, scrambling over what was left of the rucksack mountain. When he reached the rail of trouser belts, he threw one back to Ivy and took another for himself.

  Ivy jumped up to catch it.

  ‘Uncommon belts kinda do what normal belts do,’ he called, fastening the buckle. ‘They hold things up.’ He raised the belt above his head and was instantly lifted off the ground.

  Ivy felt dizzy as she watched him float up to the cave roof. She looked down at the belt in her hands. Shifting all those warm uncommon rucksacks had left her palms sweaty, but there was something else she had noticed every now and then.

  Whispers.

  Careful not to let Valian see, she held the belt to her ear. If she listened closely, she could hear voices. She couldn’t tell what they were saying – they seemed to hover at the very edge of her hearing – but she wasn’t imagining it. If the heat she felt was real, then the voices were too.

  She took a deep breath and clutched the belt tightly. She’d have to figure out what was going on later. Right now she needed to focus all her energy on rescuing Seb.

  She peered over at Valian, who was sinking back towards the remains of the rucksack mountain by lowering the uncommon belt past his waist. Once safely down, he stepped over to the elevation shaft. ‘Just copy me,’ he called. ‘We don’t have much time.’ He lifted the belt over his head and immediately rose up off the floor. Using his elbows to nudge himself clear of the walls, he headed into the shadowy hole and floated upwards.

  After Valian’s feet had disappeared, Ivy hauled herself up the rucksack hill and leaned out over the edge of the opening. There was only darkness beneath her, heavy with the smell of stagnant water. Her face flushed. She still couldn’t believe this was happening . . .

  ‘Hello?’ Her voice echoed in both directions.

  There was no response.

  Chapter Eight

  Cool air streamed through Ivy’s wet curls as she soared up the elevation shaft, Granma Sylvie’s bag rocking gently around her hips. The sensation was incredible.

  I’m flying.

  I’m actually flying.

  She could feel her face glowing with exhilaration as she clutched the uncommon belt tightly above her head, marvelling at the fact that she didn’t need to do anything. It wasn’t as if she was hanging from the belt; the belt seemed to be holding her up.

  A square of pale yellow light glowed above her – the entrance to another tunnel. As she floated up to it, Valian offered her an elbow and she pulled herself in, reaching down with her toes as she slowly lowered the belt.

  I just flew. In the air. Using a belt.

  She spotted a smirk on Valian’s face as he returned his belt to another set of hooks on the wall. As she copied him, she tried to hide her amazement. She reminded herself that Valian had made no effort to stop Seb from being arrested. She shouldn’t trust him.

  He leaned back against the wall, stretching his shoulders. ‘I can’t go any further,’ he said casually. ‘Beyond this point I’ll be recognized.’ He gestured down the tunnel. ‘When you get to the T-junction, take a left, then second right. After the cave filled with suit-carriers you go left, then down the passageway that smells of boot polish. That’ll lead you into the main arrivals chamber.’

  Ivy peered ahead. The thick gloom of the passageway was broken only by a few strips of weak lemon-squeezer light. She tried not to let Valian see her fear. ‘Er – what exactly do you want me to get for you?’

  ‘Just a candle.’

  ‘Just a candle?’

  Valian studied his nails. ‘It’s uncommon, OK? I need it to get into Lundinor, to visit someone who can clear my name.’ He nodded in the direction of the main arrivals chamber. ‘All you have to do is get into the cave. The candle trader has debts to settle with me, so you won’t have to pay him; and you don’t need to worry about finding him. He’ll find you. He always does.’

  Ivy didn’t like being given orders by someone so suspicious. ‘Fine. But first you have to tell me how to get my brother out first. That was the agreement.’

  Valian raised a hand. ‘All right, I know. The underguard station is in Lundinor, through the Great Gates. You’ll find those in the main arrivals chamber – they’re the ones with Sir Clement and Lady Citron, the founding traders of Lundinor, on either side. And next to them you’ll see some ladders. They’re the best way out of here for muckers – they’re not used much any more so they won’t be guarded. But first make sure you get my candle. Bring that back and I’ll tell you the rest – how to break into the underguard station and get your bro out of there.’

  Ivy huffed. She should have known there would be some security for him in the arrangement. ‘Fine.’

  Valian shrugged off his leather jacket. Beneath it he was wearing a black T-shirt with what Ivy assumed was the logo of a heavy metal band – it involved a rose wrapped in barbed wire. ‘Here, take this.’

  Ivy scowled as
he thrust the jacket into her arms. ‘Why do I—?’

  ‘Because you’ll need it, OK? You won’t get very far in that coat. The Ugs have circulated your description, remember? They all know what you look like.’

  Ivy groaned and reluctantly peeled off her duffel coat, depositing it in Valian’s arms, then put her granma’s bag over her shoulder again.

  ‘Anyway,’ he said with a hint of glee, ‘you’ll need to be wearing something a bit different in order to fit in. Uncommoners all wear Hobsmatch.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  Valian’s eyes twinkled. ‘You’ll find out soon enough.’

  Ivy fiddled with the strap of Granma Sylvie’s handbag, repeating Valian’s instructions over and over in her head. Left, then second right . . .

  After the third turn, the tunnel walls started to shake with noise. Ivy fought the urge to turn back. The further she went, the louder the rumble of voices and shuffling footsteps became. Eventually she turned the final corner and was forced to grip the rock for support as a wall of sound rose up to meet her.

  ‘Whoa . . .’

  In front of her was another chamber, but this one was gigantic. The gaping roof glittered with red-brown stalactites, as long and jagged as giant fangs, and the walls were so high they disappeared into shadow. Against them were stacks of every type of bag imaginable: ostrich-leather handbags, sequinned purses, neoprene rucksacks, canvas sacks, duffel bags; even the odd cheap, rustling carrier bag tied onto the sides of larger cases. If the first arrivals chamber Ivy had crawled into was like a cloakroom fortress, then this one was more like the Colosseum.

  On the floor hundreds of uncommoners bustled around, hopping over cases, bags swinging at their sides, some dragging children behind them. Ivy remained in the shadows of the tunnel while she observed them. She struggled to take in all the costumes: there was a lady in a silky kimono and herringbone tweed jacket; a man wearing breeches and a Hawaiian shirt; another lady in camouflage trousers, platform shoes and a baseball cap. Ivy watched wide-eyed as three kids wearing tight plastic raincoats over Roman togas chased each other through a group in petticoats and puff sleeves. Men in cycling shorts and sombreros stood next to others in top hats and tunics. There were fancy feathered collars, felt berets, shimmering Egyptian headdresses, fur stoles, medieval veils. It was as if everyone had taken bits of fashion throughout history and put them all on at once.