by Caro King
Vispilio watched, a frown creasing Doctor Mel’s creamy forehead.
‘You see,’ Strood went on, ‘it occurred to me the other day, that maybe I could do more with the Maug. It is, after all, my Death. It’s a pretty unique relationship and I don’t feel that I have properly explored all the options.’
‘For example?’ Vispilio sounded thoughtful, as if he too were thinking things through. A look came into his eyes, one of amazed realisation (quickly covered up) followed by one of cold calculation. ‘How much command do you have over it?’ he asked softly. ‘Does it come when you call?’
‘Hmm?’ Strood was barely paying attention. He waved a hand dismissively. ‘Oh possibly. It’s always here, so I’ve never had the need to try. No, I’m thinking of something more dramatic. Like … why a dog, do you think? Why not … something less … limited?’
Vispilio gasped as the Maug’s great body shuddered and heaved. The creature opened its mouth in a silent howl, then leapt into the air. Its great shape hung for a moment, then twisted and tore apart, exploding soundlessly into a thousand smaller fragments that filled the air in a swirling mass. Each one began to re-shape itself, putting out beaks, spindly claw legs. Wings.
The Death birds rose, circling upwards to mill about just below the crystal roof of the Sunatorium. They hung there in a black cloud, dribbling shadows like rain that dissolved into the air as it fell.
‘Much more convenient,’ said Strood, ‘for sweeping through the Drift, devouring every living thing they see. Don’t you think?’
As if given a signal, the Death Flock veered and dipped, heading for the door. It burst open under the pressure of many small bodies and they streamed through into the hall and then out of the nearest smashed-in window. Through the crystal walls of the Sunatorium, Jibbit watched as they poured into the sky, a funnel of inky shadow that gathered above the Terrible House in a spreading and eerily quiet cloud. There were none of the normal bird sounds, no twittering or singing, just the whirr of thousands of small, darkness-dripping wings.
The Death Flock wheeled in the sky. Then it headed inland.
Strood went to the door and locked it, pocketing the key.
Vispilio cleared Doctor Mel’s throat, feeling suddenly nervous. His plan had undergone a rapid rethink. Far from taking Strood over and ruling the Drift, it had become more like just getting out alive.
‘So, what? They’ll finish off anyone still living?’ he said, trying to buy time. ‘And what about the girl? Isn’t that just a little dull? Giving her the same fate as everyone else!’
‘Oh, the Death Flock will head straight for Hilfian; it is intended only for those Quick and Grimm who survived my army. I have other plans for the girl, as I’m about to demonstrate. I’m going to deal with her personally.’ Strood beamed. ‘Now here we need to backtrack a little. Remember that bungled experiment I referred to? The one that made me immortal? I’m sure you do remember, because I believe it was you, Ava, who established my immortality by throwing me to the wolves.’
Strood held out a hand. It was smooth with new skin and the only odd thing about it was a bluish-black tinge to the fingertips. ‘Hmm.’ He held out the other one, also tipped with bluish-black, but this time seamed with so many scars it looked like miniature crazy paving.
‘As you can see, torn apart as I was, I healed up again.’
‘I remember,’ said Vispilio, coldly.
Strood looked at the woman in front of him. He looked right through her skin to her heart where the once-sorcerer was crouching, like a spider at the heart of a web.
‘So do I,’ he said. He smiled warmly. ‘And so, to make amends, you can help me test the fate I have in mind for young Ninevah.’ He took a step forward.
Vispilio took a step back.
‘You may have noticed,’ went on Strood, ‘the strange discolouration to my fingers?’
Vispilio nodded, his eyes darting anxiously this way and that. Jibbit could see that he wasn’t used to being nervous and didn’t know how to handle it.
‘Does it remind you of anything?’
In fact it was Doctor Mel who knew the answer, but Vispilio had already ransacked the contents of her captive mind.
‘Faerie pox?’ he said. ‘A nasty disease visited on the Quick by the faerie race when they wanted to clear a village. It died out with the faeries.’
‘Funnily enough, not all of it. Mafig … remember him? He was the Quick apothecary who helped the Seven create the Deathweave … Well, he saved a man’s life once by distilling the pox right out of him. Kept it as a memento. I discovered it in my laboratory, though I didn’t think I’d find such an interesting use for it.’
Strood advanced on Vispilio, evil glittering in his quartz eye. It was doing pretty well in the other one too. Vispilio had backed right up against Jibbit’s table, eyes widening with horror.
‘I drank it,’ went on Strood. ‘Of course, it can’t kill me, because I’m immortal. Which means I’m just … a carrier …’
Vispilio went white, then drew Doctor Mel’s body up to its full height. ‘Do your worst,’ he hissed. ‘In my own way, I’m immortal too. It can only hurt for a while.’
‘True,’ said Strood as his fingers touched the middle of Mel’s forehead. ‘But it can hurt A LOT.’
Strood’s finger left a pink mark. The pink deepened to red. A pimple appeared and became a spot which became a pustule surrounded by angry-looking skin. Another pimple, and another, both already swelling. Vispilio stopped glaring at Strood and reached up to scratch. The pustules burst, smearing sticky white goo over Doctor Mel’s once smooth forehead. More pimples, spreading down around the eyes, nose and mouth. Vispilio scratched again. The itch was irresistible.
‘Ugh!’ He looked with disgust at his fingers, which had already begun to swell. ‘Well, Strood, I don’t think much of your fearful disease.’
His voice sounded thick, slurry, as if his tongue was too big. Which it was. The ends of his fingers were turning black and puffy. He coughed as his tongue, now too black and swollen to fit in his mouth, popped out and lolled. His eyes bulged and Strood smiled as he saw panic arrive in them.
‘Changed your mind?’ he said. ‘I’m guessing the pain has begun, something like every inch of your skin splitting open. Which it’s going to do in just a few minutes. Oh and the struggling to breathe can’t be fun.’
Vispilio gave a strangled gasping sound, his eyes now so swollen they bulged out of his sockets. His arms flailed as he sank to the ground.
Watching, Jibbit made a disgusted face as the smell, something like rotten fruit, reached him. Vispilio screamed as great rips began to appear in his skin. Ooze oozed out of them.
‘Just think, once you could have saved yourself. Once, when you were more than just a passenger in a Quick body. Only a sorcerer’s touch can stop the faerie pox. No wonder the faeries hated them, they always had to be better at everything.’
There were more screams and rips, then a wet popping sound followed by a horrible slithering one as Vispilio descended into a pool of mush, some clothes and a nice, clean, leftover skeleton. The ring dropped off Doctor Mel’s finger bone and Strood reached down to pick it up and clean it off on a handkerchief. He looked up to see Jibbit watching anxiously.
‘Not immortal,’ he explained warmly. ‘An immortal cannot die. According to the story, Vispilio will only live again if his spell finds a Quick to wear the ring. I’m going to make sure it doesn’t.’
Jibbit nodded, trying to make the gesture as humble as possible.
Strood beamed as he examined his blackened fingetips. ‘Well, that worked then. I shall enjoy using the faerie pox on the girl even more now I know exactly what’s coming to her.’ He fished Vispilio’s boots out of the pile of clothing and mush.
‘Hmm, a little ickier than I would have liked, but they’ll do.’
Cautiously, Jibbit raised a claw. ‘Erm, but how will yoo know where she is?’
Strood’s smile widened. ‘Oh I’ve got that co
vered too.’ Out of his pocket he took a circle of metal, its rim etched with twisting symbols that made Jibbit’s eyes water to look at. Balanced on the outer edge of the rim was a ruby.
‘Interesting thing about faeries, you know. Hopeless sense of direction. Made a lot of compasses. There are tons of them scattered about the Drift.’
He held it up.
‘Find me Ninevah Redstone,’ he said, and the ruby rolled to point south-west.
33
For the Wolves, Ava
Arafin Strood stepped out of the Terrible House for the first time in decades and snuffed the air. It felt cold in his throat and lungs, probably something to do with the stretches of Raw towering against the sky in all directions.
He was wearing Vispilio’s boots strapped on over his usual black silk suit, he was holding the compass in one hand, and he had a rope strung around his neck. It was a strange rope, woven from freshly plucked stalks of crowsmorte twisted together in a complicated plait. Jibbit, tucked under Strood’s arm, wondered what the rope did and was ready to bet it wasn’t nice. He also wondered why Strood was taking him along on the trip and in particular why Strood had strapped Vispilio’s ring to his back with twine, wound uncomfortably around his useless wings. Again, he was ready to bet that he wouldn’t like the answer. So he didn’t ask. Just to be on the safe side.
‘Hang on,’ said Strood cheerfully.
Jibbit had never seen him in such a good mood, not even when he was throwing people to the tigers or sending them to die horribly in the Engine.
Strood took a step forward and Jibbit hooted as the ground spun beneath them, whirling along in a blur. Coming to a stop, Strood turned to look back. Far behind them the House reared against the horizon. The boots had carried them so far with one single step that they had caught up with the Death Flock as it sailed through the morning sky, on its way to bring doom to Hilfian.
‘Well, well,’ said Strood. ‘Though bear in mind that we will have to go the long way round.’
‘Because of all the Raw?’ said Jibbit timidly.
‘Naturally.’
Strood set off again. Each step was like flying very low over the ground, but jerky because every time Strood’s feet touched the earth there was a horrible jolt. The pace was dizzying and Jibbit closed his eyes, praying that the journey would soon be over.
Although Strood was carefully avoiding most of the patches of Raw he came across, even though it often took him well out of his way, there was one patch he was planning to visit.
‘You see,’ he explained to Jibbit, ‘if I land right on the edge of the nothingness that you described to me, the nothingness at the heart of the Heart, then we should be able to stop for a while without our mode of transport being eaten away entirely.’
‘But if we miss the edge and end up in the middle of the Raw …?’
‘Then I’ll get out again quickly.’
‘And if we miss the other way and end up …’
‘Then we will fall forever into nothingness,’ said Strood comfortably. ‘It’s a gamble, but what is life without a little risk, eh?’
Jibbit was silent. He thought it best. He fixed his eyes on the mist walls of the Heart, looming against the sky.
‘Here we go,’ said Strood, and took a step.
His calculations had been meticulous and so the step was only a small one to make sure he didn’t overshoot. There was a moment of freezing fogginess and then a jolt as they stopped.
‘Just as I thought,’ said Strood.
They were standing on a single ridge of rock, like a raised pathway stretching across the nothingness. A way behind them, the Raw hung like a luminous curtain, its surface shifting restlessly, as if it didn’t like being on the edge of death. Their one ridge ran out of it, its rocky surface topped with a faint layer of mist that Jibbit could barely see.
‘There you are,’ said Strood cheerfully. ‘It would take that days to dissolve these boots away. Or the compass for that matter.’
‘Where does it go?’
‘Ah. Good question. Right across the Heart, I believe. You see, the mud creature, the so-called new Fabulous,’ he chuckled to himself, ‘had to have cut across the Heart somehow to reach the Redstone girl in time to be part of our little story, and being made of mud he couldn’t use the river. So, even though you told me that there was nothing here in the heart of the Heart, I knew there had to be a way across.’
They were both quiet for a moment, stone and madman, standing together on the single thread of rock that ran across the heart of the Heart. Around them the emptiness was so complete that Jibbit thought it would crush him with the weight of its dark, silent nothing. Though it had to be somewhere nearby, he couldn’t even hear the river, its great rushing was swallowed up in the emptiness. To distract himself he looked down at their path of rock and wondered where it went before it reached the other side of the Heart.
‘Well,’ said Strood briskly. ‘It’s been interesting. I’m glad I stopped off, and not just because I have a task to perform here.’
‘A task?’
‘Vengeance to wreak, that kind of thing. You see, there is always a gap between legend and the truth. According to the story, Vispilio will die if no Quick puts the ring on within … say … a few days. Frankly I think that any evil genius worth his salt would not take a risk quite that stupid. I suspect that in reality he could last for years sealed in that ring. Centuries even. Until someone found him. So, I will make sure that no one ever does.’
Jibbit gulped.
Strood held him out over the edge of the path, dangling him over the void. The ring, tied to the gargoyle’s wings, clinked against his stony back.
‘I would say it’s been nice knowing you, but frankly I couldn’t give a damn. You are, to me, just a handy weight.’
And then Strood let go.
He watched for a moment as the gargoyle fell, plummeting down into the darkness. It made no noise and Strood’s last glimpse was of its stony eyes and beak opened wide with shock and of its paws, spread out and waving wildly. The tied-on ring glinted once, shining out with a red light that soon dwindled to a tiny spark in the darkness before it vanished altogether.
Arafin Strood smiled. ‘For the wolves, Ava,’ he said, ‘for the wolves. May you fall forever.’
And then he took a step, the travelling boots whirled him away and he was gone.
Jibbit had no time to cry out. His last glimpse was of Strood’s face watching him as he fell, a red light flaring in his quartz eye and a smile playing across his thin lips.
The feeling of shock wore off quickly enough and after a few minutes Jibbit got used to falling. He wasn’t afraid of hitting the bottom because there wasn’t one. Even so, he didn’t fancy the idea that the falling could last forever. He felt it might get boring after a few years. It was already quite dull.
He took stock of his surroundings. Up – nothing. Down – nothing. To the left – nothing. To the right – the side of the ridge rushing past him revealed only by the faint haze of Raw clinging to its irregular surface. He had a nasty feeling that it would only rush past him for a few miles before it ran out altogether and then there would be nothing on that side too.
The thought terrified him into action. He flailed with his paws, trying to catch on to the bumps and folds of the rock. Instead he managed to turn his body over so that he was facing down instead of up. Now he could sense the nothing rushing up to meet him, could FEEL the point at which the rock ran out. Then there would be only him and the ring in the middle of all that eternity.
Now he hooted at the top of his voice.
He flailed again and managed to spin over, end to end. Something caught him hard in the back and redhot pain flared through him. He spun giddily, and then whacked into the wall, front side against the rock and face down towards the void. Even through the agony, the knowledge of what was ahead if he failed made him stick out his paws and shove his beak in, using them as a kind of break to slow him down. He slithered and cl
ung on, his front paws ploughing into the cliff face and sending chips of rock flying into the void. He slowed. A bump came up, like a mini-ledge, and at last he ground to a halt, his front paws and beak jammed against the jutting edge, his eyes staring wildly over it into the emptiness spinning away below him.
And something else too. Still falling, turning over and over in the air as it plunged on into the darkness, was a lump of rock. His wings! Broken off, he realised, when he had smashed into the cliff the first time. Tied to them, glinting with a red light that held something of rage and something of sheer terror, was the ring. It glimmered, a spark that dwindled fast and then was gone, swallowed up in forever.
Tears leaked from Jibbit’s eyes as he hugged the wall of rock, working his fingers and toes deeper in even as he wept. He stayed like that for a while, face down towards the darkness, until the shock and panic wore off. Then he took stock. The damage to his back was not too bad. Although he couldn’t see the ragged, lumpy mess left by his broken wings, he knew that he hadn’t been cracked through because he was clearly holding together. His top half was still joined to his bottom half and that, when you got right down to it, was the thing that mattered. He had lost a finger, and possibly a couple of toes and his beak felt chipped, but he was basically whole.
Next he looked at the Raw nibbling at the face of the rock wall he was clinging to. The Raw was taking a long time about eating the rock away, probably because of all the nothing that was in turn eating away the Raw. The Raw didn’t seem to be doing any damage to Jibbit at all, and he wondered if the dose of Quick soaked into his stony being was offering some protection. It was cold, he knew that. Any creature of flesh would be facing frostbite, but Jibbit wasn’t a creature of flesh.
Satisfied that he was in no immediate danger, Jibbit inched the fingers of his right front paw over a little. He followed with the toes of his left back paw. Then he shifted his left fingers over, followed by his right toes and so on until he had turned right round and was facing up. Then, quickly regaining his confidence, Jibbit began to climb.
