by Clive Barker
“He has legions of likenesses of that infernal child of his, the Commexo Kid. All of them are a perfect copy of the original (if indeed there ever was a living original, which I highly doubt). These legions came against us in swarms, with no weapons except their numbers, which I begin to fear are limitless. Knowing the importance with which you view the extinguishing of the city’s lights, I am writing in the hope that you may somehow lend your own powers to those of your faithful legions. I fear the victory that is your right will not come to pass until the balance of power is tipped in our favor, and I can think of no more certain way of making that a reality than by your personal intervention to turn the tide of this battle. I believe with your presence here the struggle to extinguish this city and to hang the architect, Rojo Pixler, from a lamppost, will be quickly realized.”
The letter moved the Old Mother to action on the instant. She wrote some fifty letters on the air, and conjuring for each a wind to bear it away, let them go their many ways. Then, ordering Maratien to accompany her, she called down the ethereal staircase that led from the mosaic-laden chamber up to the roof of the Needle Tower.
“Stay close to me, girl,” the Old Mother said. “I am about to let powers loose in whose path I would not want you to get caught.”
“They would harm me?”
“They would kill you, Maratien. Take the hem of my dress. Why do you hesitate?”
“The dolls, lady.”
“Souls. That’s all they are. Enemies of our mighty intent. They’re just afraid that you’re going to take them from me. Go, grip the gown tight. Tighter still. That’s it. Now don’t move.”
“I won’t.”
“Good. Trust me. You’re quite safe. Take the visions as they come.”
“I am ready, my lady.”
“You must be brave and drink in all the visions I am about to show us. They will exist but once. After my Midnight, they will be gone. For there has never been such a sight as this before, nor will ever be again.”
So saying she pulled the collar of her gown away from her neck, exposing her clavicle. There was precious little flesh upon her, and the finely curved bone stood clear of her skin, which had a jaundiced hue. With a sudden burst of speed, she reached into her own flesh and caught hold of the bone, snatching it out of her body, apparently without any pain. A metallic tang attended its revelation, a smell of magic, which drew countless blends of darkness out of air.
“What’s happening?” Maratien asked, her voice shaking, more with awe than with fear.
“I am calling together the nine parts of my beloved deathing ship, The Stormwalker, which was the labor of a hundred years and ten to build, all of it done in hiding.”
“Why so long?”
“That will be plain, when you have sight of it,” Mater Motley said. “Be patient, child. The pieces rise, even as we speak.”
She spoke the truth. As soon as she had raised her summoning clavicle into the air, and her orders had gone forth, in nine places around the islands, all of them wastelands or wildernesses where nothing lived to know the secret that lay hidden in the earth there. Now the buried mysteries rolled over in their tombs of dirt and stone so that the ground cracked and gaped. Nine vast implacable forms, none smaller than a cathedral (and most much larger), slowly rose up into the air.
Two of the nine parts of The Stormwalker moved toward each other as they had been programmed to do before they were buried, their massive forms tumbling over as they converged, meticulously aligning themselves so as to fit perfectly with the other, the two becoming one. The new singularity formed the vast engine of the machine, the thunder of which rolled around the sky. There would be lightning to accompany it in time, spat from the underbelly of what would be, upon completion, a vessel three-quarters of a mile long—the Stormwalker Christopher Carrion had spoken of—so called because it would stride on legs of lightning.
Mater Motley called forth visions of the remaining seven parts resurrecting themselves, throwing off their blankets of earth and rising to greet the first morning of the Night. She felt the profoundest pleasure to witness the approach of the nine parts of The Stormwalker. Only she knew the genius that had brought the vessel into being. Only she knew that the forges in which its many metals had been melted together, in an alloy so black it made Midnight look like a blaze of Noon, had not been fired up in the Abarat, nor ever could have been. Only she knew that the minds that had aided her in its design and construction had been those of beings more remote from the islands than the stars. They were the Nephauree. They were from a place, or state of mind, called the Zael Maz’yre. It, and they, existed behind the stars.
But nobody in this little Empire of hers needed to know about any of that now. Just as the time had finally come for her to pluck forth her clavicle and summon up her deathing ship, so the time would come when she would let her true allegiances be known. The alien intelligences that lived beyond the mausoleums of the real had trusted her with their knowledge so that she might lay a road of blood out for them, where they could sit enthroned and dictate the nature of magic from here to the end of the world.
That, in essence, was the pact between them. The Nephauree provided the technical genius to design the Stormwalker, along with the armaments and war-machines. It was Nephaurite technology that would decide the outcome of the battle to preserve this darkness until it had done its dark work, and it would carry the day. With the islands under her thumb, the Empress would return the favor in kind. While she led the Abarat into an Age of Blood and Gold, the Nephauree would be preparing to draw down a curtain over all things beneath the stars. With their Empress, they had been so high protected from all harm by their devices, they would be able to come and go from the islands with impunity.
Subjugated to their Empress’s will, the people of the Abarat would not see the monstrous presences in their world. But, year on year, the work would be done: the land plundered and left fallow, the seeds sewn until the time of harvest was upon them. And with that harvest, the end of this foolish game of life. One last season of fecundity, and then Time no longer. Life no longer. And Death incarnate smiling in the silence.
Chapter 46
Talking of Mysteries
CANDY HAD BEEN STARING out at the darkness, sky and sea for perhaps an hour, searching her thoughts for any sign, however small, of Boa’s presence. She had found none. But that didn’t mean she was cleansed of Boa’s contagion. She had lived for almost sixteen years believing she was Candy Quackenbush and only Candy Quackenbush, never once realizing that she had another presence inside her head. How could she say with absolute certainty that this wasn’t still true?
Of course she couldn’t. That was the sickening truth. She couldn’t know for sure that whatever thread of Boa had twitched into wakefulness when it had seemed Candy’s life was over was not still lying in the coils of her mind.
And then, from the shore behind her, the sound of agitated voices rose up. What was happening? Something significant, that much was apparent. There was a sickening reverberation in the air and earth. She could feel the shake as it gusted against her face, and could hear the little pebbles at her feet rattling against one another.
Had she not been watching the twin darknesses of water and sky for so long she would not have seen what she saw next for her eyes would have been unable to distinguish one darkness from another. But they were far subtler instruments than they’d been at the beginning, and in the two darknesses, the one above and the other below, she saw to her distress a third order of darkness moving against the other two. Its silhouette was a puzzlement. What manner of creature was this?
A massive shape was moving across the sky, barely grazing the horizon. Even though its mass was entirely black, and offered no clue to its true structure, there was something about its slow, steady motion that told Candy it was gargantuan: the size of a city, at least. But this vast thing tumbled as it crossed the sky, presenting Candy with a subtly different silhouette as it did so. When she tri
ed to imagine it, all her imagination could conjure up was something that resembled an immense geometrical puzzle. Its passage across her field of vision affected everything around her. The air reverberated. The pebbles rattled and became louder and faster. As for Mama Izabella, she lay smooth and glacial, every ripple and wave laying down in defiance to the passage of the immense traveler.
Behind her, Candy heard people asking the same questions she’d had in her head. Even though the mystery had passed from sight, people spoke in fearful whispers.
“What was it?”
“I heard no engines, nothing. A thing that size ought to make a noise.”
“Well, it didn’t.”
“Then it’s not Abaratian.”
“And where was it going?”
It was Geneva who provided the answer to that.
“It was moving south-southwest,” she said. “It’s going to Gorgossium.”
There was a surge of responses to this from the people in Geneva’s vicinity. But there was one voice that was more audible to Candy than any of the others. It was the last voice she wanted to hear, but she wasn’t all that surprised to be hearing it.
The Peachtree woman’s right, Princess Boa said in Candy’s head. Whatever that was it’s heading for Gorgossium.
For a moment Candy contemplated the possibility of pretending she’d heard nothing, but what was the use of that? Boa knew she’d been heard. Ignoring her would be a waste of vital time.
I thought we’d parted, Candy allowed her mind to say.
You mean you thought you’d got rid of me, Boa replied. You wanted me gone. Come on, don’t say you didn’t. You’d had me in your head all those years and you wanted me out.
You’re right. I did. And I still do.
Really? Isn’t it just a little lonely in there? Come on. Of all people, you can own up to me. It’s a lot lonelier in there than you thought it would be, isn’t it?
I’m not going to invite you back in, if that’s what you’re after.
I asked you a question.
Yes, it’s a little spacious in here, all right.
She felt Boa make a small smile of satisfaction.
Oh, you’re never happier than when someone else is unhappy, are you?
Isn’t everyone? They just don’t admit to it.
What do you want?
Nothing. I was just checking in. I want to keep a connection between us. I might need your sisterhood one day.
I can’t imagine that ever happening.
Who knows? We are each trapped in the blinding procession of linear time. There is no way to know what the future holds.
What about Finnegan?
What about him?
He’s with you, isn’t he?
What if he is?
Don’t hurt him, Boa.
There was no reply to this.
Boa? Candy said.
Shall we change the subject?
He spent sixteen years avenging your murder.
Yes, so he’s told me, more than once.
He loves you.
No, Candy. He loves somebody he thought was me.
Then let him go if you don’t love him. Just don’t hurt him.
What is this? Has the little witch-girl fallen in love with the son of night and day?
Not in the way you mean, no. I’m not in love with him. But I won’t see him hurt.
Empty threats, Candy. But don’t worry. His heart’s safe with me.
Yeah, I’m sure.
Moving on . . . You saw the thing in the sky, I presume.
Do you know what it is? Candy said.
During their conversation the huge dark form had moved all the way across the horizon, and was almost out of sight.
I can’t be certain, but Carrion once told me something about a sky-ship, a Stormwalker. It walked on legs of lightning, he said, hence the name.
Yeah. He told me about it too. But I don’t see any legs of lightning on that.
He did? Huh. Well, I think it’s just a part of the ship. It was made in many pieces, all hidden around the Abarat. That way she could do what I think she’s probably doing now—
Bringing all the pieces together . . .
So that her death-ship can walk the storm. I have no way of knowing for sure, but—
Suddenly, Candy glimpsed, for a moment only, Finnegan, through Boa’s eyes. He did not look happy that he was finally reunited with his beloved. Far from it. His clothes were torn and bloodied, and his expression desolate. Though Candy saw him for no longer than a couple of heartbeats he looked up in that brief time, and even though there can’t have been any visible sign of her presence in the secret chambers where he was Boa’s guest or prisoner, it seemed that in that little time he looked at Candy. Looked and saw.
Finnegan . . . she thought, expecting that this tantalizing glimpse was most likely just another piece of Boa’s manipulations.
And then Boa was gone, and the great room of Candy’s head was hers again, and hers alone.
Chapter 47
Convergence
“SHE WAS HERE, CANDY, wasn’t she?”
Candy didn’t turn to look back at Malingo. She just kept staring out at the darkness of sea and sky.
“How did you know?”
“Something about your body. It was different when you were together talking to her. And then I got used to seeing you as you. Just Candy.”
“And when she came visiting . . .”
“I don’t know what it was exactly. But it didn’t seem to be a happy chat.”
“I have to go to Huffaker, Malingo.”
“Why? What’s there?”
“That’s where she’s got Finnegan. And I don’t think he’s as happy in her company as he expected to be. Not remotely.”
“How are we going to get there?”
“Not we, me.”
“There is no me, Candy. There’s only we.”
“Oh, Lordy Lou . . .” she murmured, her voice close to breaking. “What did you have to go and say that for?”
“Because it’s true. You saved me from Wolfswinkel—”
“And now you’re going to save me from the rest of the world?”
“If need be.”
“Do you want to tell the others then?” Candy said. “I know they’re all suspicious of me, and maybe they have good reason. You should tell them that what we saw out there was a part of a death-ship, a Stormwalker, Boa called it. Apparently it’s two miles long.”
“What? No. That can’t be.”
“Well we were just seeing a part of it, actually.”
“And what is it?”
“Boa called it a death-ship.”
“Oh, lovely.”
“I don’t know if anyone is interested in my opinion, but I suggest that the best thing everybody can do is just lay low. There are terrible things happening out there right now.”
“I’m sure.”
“But it won’t last forever. We’ve got to remember that. The sacbrood are dead up there, or dying. And it’s only a matter of time before they start to decay, and a rain of brood bodies will start falling.”
“Well, that’s something to look forward to,” Malingo said dryly. “And then the stars will start showing through again.”
“Oh yes. That will be welcome. But it’s going to be a grim, filthy mess, Malingo. Light or no light.” She drew a deep breath. “I’m going to walk a little way along the beach. Make a glyph.”
“I’ll talk to the rest of the folks.”
“Tell them I don’t think Boa is going to cause any more problems, will you? She’s gone, and I really don’t think she’ll be back.”
“Famous last words.”
“Well, I can hope, can’t I?”
“That you can,” Malingo replied. “That and not much else.”
The pieces of the Stormwalker converged on Gorgossium like nine vast curses carved out of gleaming black destruction. They made the Izabella crazy as they converged on the island, churning her water
s up until they were white and the shadowy air through which they passed was stirred up into an insanity of its own, its particles sticking against one another, causing trillions of tiny fires to ignite all around them.
Atop the Needle Tower Mater Motley turned her clavicle, the black, polished surface of which was an unmistakable echo of the nine pieces which had now come to a halt all around the island’s perimeter. Like the air around the Needle, and the Needle itself, Maratien was shaking violently, out of sheer terror.
“What are you thinking, girl?” the Old Mother asked her.
“They’re so huge . . . how do they stay in the sky?”
“It isn’t Abaratian magic that made them,” Mater Motley said. “Or that moves them. It is the technology of Those Who Walk Behind the Stars.” She glanced down at Maratien. “Next time I go to them, you will come with me.”
“To the other side of the stars?” Maratien murmured as though she was testing the words to see if they contained the truth.
“Watch now,” the Old Mother said, raising the black clavicle higher than her head.
She uttered an instruction in a language that Maratien had never heard before. Something ignited in the marrow of the bone, and blazed from the hairline fissures, shards of flickering illumination that raced away in all directions. Time grew lazy, or so it seemed to Maratien. Her body lost its appetite for breath. The rhythm of her heart slowed to a funereal pace, from beneath the beat of which the noise of what might have been a thousand thousand thunders rose, one noise rolling into the next so that it became a single unbroken sound, its volume steadily climbing.
It was the sound of the Stormwalker’s energies she was hearing, she knew. There were lights coming in the nine parts of the ship: rows of tiny windows in one place, a vast sigil in another, as alien to Maratien’s eye as the words she’d heard the Old Mother utter had been to her ears. There were other signs of how remote from anything familiar to her the device was. As the power of the engines climbed, and the lights within the parts multiplied and grew stronger, they shed their illumination in sections of the vast machines that had not been visible until now. What had looked like plain black surfaces from a distance now showed their true faces. They were etched with elaborate detail, black on black on black.
