Museum of Thieves

by Lian Tanner

  It seemed to Goldie that the boy was talking in riddles. She shook her head in angry confusion. ‘It was the brizzlehound that knocked me into the ditch. And it wasn’t trying to save me. It was trying to kill me!’

  Sinew cleared his throat. ‘The shadows are deep in this part of the museum, and the light is uncertain. The noise and the headlights would have made it even worse. A small dog could easily appear monstrous.’

  ‘No!’ said Goldie. ‘That’s not what happened!’

  But when she looked around, trying to remember the moment when that . . . that thing had risen up out of the thornberry bushes, she found that it was already fading into a confused blur. The shadows were deep. The light was uncertain. Could it have been a little dog?

  No.

  I don’t know.

  . . . Maybe.

  Olga Ciavolga leaned down and patted Broo on the head. ‘You are a clever boy.’ She had a slight accent, as if she had been born somewhere other than the Faroon Peninsula. ‘Tonight you get extra bones.’

  The little dog wriggled with pleasure and wagged his tail.

  ‘But what’s this about the Shark?’ Herro Dan’s kind face was worried. He squatted down next to Goldie. ‘Is it true, lass? Did my street-rig nearly run you down?’

  Goldie nodded.

  ‘By my life, I’m sorry,’ said the old man.

  ‘Tsk, what good is sorry if she is squashed?’ muttered Olga Ciavolga.

  ‘I wouldn’t have had this happen for the world,’ Herro Dan said to Goldie. ‘The old Shark’s never gone off by itself before.’

  ‘So why now?’ said Sinew.

  ‘Reckon it’s this trouble,’ said Herro Dan, getting to his feet again. ‘It’s stirrin’ things up. Old dangers. New ones, too, from the look of things. We best be on our guard, all of us.’

  ‘You should’ve heard the Shark’s horn!’ said Toadspit. ‘It was howling like a lost baby.’

  ‘And lost we shall be,’ said Olga Ciavolga sharply, ‘if we do nothing but be on our guard! We must discover where this trouble is coming from, and stop it!’

  Herro Dan nodded. ‘Sinew, tomorrow you go out into the city again. Talk to everyone you know. Ask questions. The bombin’, start with that, it has to be part of it—’

  Goldie’s head was beginning to throb and the water from the ditch felt as if it had seeped into her bones. She sniffed unhappily. Everyone seemed to have forgotten about her. Maybe they’d decided that she wouldn’t be useful after all. If only Ma and Pa were here! A tear trickled down her cheek at the thought of them.

  The little dog gazed up at her with his head cocked to one side and his curly tail stirring the air. His black eyes were sympathetic, as if he knew exactly how she was feeling.

  Goldie tried to tell herself that she should be afraid of him. But she was already covered in mud and dirty water, and she probably had purple fever or lockjaw. And Ma and Pa were going to prison and it was all her fault.

  A few dog germs can’t make things any worse.

  She put her hand out and the little dog sniffed it. Cautiously, she stroked his ear. It was warmer and silkier than she expected.

  ‘Broo,’ she whispered, trying out his name. The little dog wagged his tail so furiously that his whole body wagged with it. Then, before Goldie could stop him, he jumped into her lap, put his paws on her shoulders and began to lick her face with his hot red tongue.

  Goldie closed her eyes and tried not to think about how she had nearly died, waiting for someone to come along and save her. She shivered. I’ll never do that again, she thought. Next time I’ll save myself.

  ‘So, did the Blessed Guardians find anything in our records to satisfy their curiosity?’ said Olga Ciavolga.

  It was late at night, and the three keepers were doing their rounds.

  ‘Dust. Silverfish. A cockroach or two,’ said Sinew, who carried his harp slung over his shoulder. ‘Nothing useful. They’ve gone now. I doubt they’ll be back.’

  He yawned. Olga Ciavolga peered up at him. ‘You should be asleep,’ she said, ‘like the children.’

  ‘She’s right, Sinew,’ said Herro Dan. ‘You got a lot to do tomorrow. Won’t be easy, tryin’ to track those bombers.’

  Sinew smiled faintly, but said nothing. The three of them walked on, down a long corridor of marble statues.

  ‘Maybe it was a mistake,’ said Sinew, when they were halfway down the corridor, ‘bringing Goldie here at a time like this.’

  ‘Tsk, it was no mistake,’ said Olga Ciavolga. ‘Where else would she go?’

  ‘It’s so dangerous for a child,’ said Sinew. ‘It’s bad enough that Toadspit’s here. I’d send him home if I could.’

  ‘You know as well as I do,’ said Olga Ciavolga severely, ‘that if we do not find the source of this trouble, and stop it, then both Goldie and Toadspit will be in danger wherever they are. No one in the city will be safe.’

  ‘But I don’t—’

  Olga Ciavolga laid her hand on his arm. Her face softened. ‘Broo likes her, and that counts for much. Tomorrow I will take her to Harry Mount and let the museum test her.’

  ‘Then we’ll tell her why we brought her here,’ said Herro Dan, ‘and leave the rest up to her.’

  ‘Well, of course!’ said Olga Ciavolga. ‘Did you think I was going to force her? Am I a Blessed Guardian now?’

  ‘Ha!’ said Herro Dan. ‘You, a Blessed Guardian? Now that I’d like to see!’

  ‘You think I would not be good at it?’ Olga Ciavolga glared at him, but her mouth twitched as if she was trying not to smile.

  ‘I reckon you’d keep ’em all on their toes—’

  He broke off. The watergas lamps on the walls suddenly flickered as if their wicks needed trimming. The museum shifted. The statues disappeared, and in their place was row after row of ancient cannon, their black muzzles smoking as if they had just been fired.

  Herro Dan and Olga Ciavolga looked at each other. ‘I don’t like this,’ muttered Herro Dan. ‘I don’t like this one bit!’

  Sinew said nothing. He unslung his harp and ran his fingers over the strings. Then he squatted down between two of the cannon and began to play with grim concentration, as if the lives of Goldie and Toadspit and everyone else in the city depended upon him.

  Which, in truth, they did.

  .

  hat night, Goldie slept with Broo curled up against her stomach. She was glad to have him there. When she woke up crying for Ma and Pa, he licked away her tears. And when a great black shadow stalked through her dreams, looking first like a brizzlehound and then like Guardian Hope and then like some horrible combination of the two, the little dog whined softly and snuggled against her.

  There were no windows in this part of the museum, so she didn’t know what time it was when she woke up properly. Broo was gone, and she was hungry. She thought it must be morning.

  For a little while she sat on her mattress and waited for someone to come and get her. But then she got sick of waiting and went looking for the kitchen where she had eaten supper the night before.

  It was not where she remembered it being.

  At first she thought she must have taken a wrong turning, so she retraced her steps to where she had slept, and started again. But she ended up back at the same blank wall.

  She ran her hand over the chipped plaster. It was here last night. I’m sure it was.

  She turned in a circle, feeling like an idiot. To her left was the way she had come. To her right was a gloomy corridor that she had never seen before. In the back of her mind, the little voice whispered, Go that way.

  The little voice was usually right, so, after a moment’s hesitation, Goldie tiptoed down the gloomy corridor, listening carefully for the sound of runaway street-rigs or hungry slaughterbirds. When she came to a doorway, the little voice urged her through it, into a room full of wooden masks with cruel eyes. The next room was full of statues, and the one after that seemed to be made entirely of giant bones.

  And then, s
uddenly, there was the kitchen, smelling of scones and jam and hot chocolate. Toadspit scowled as Goldie walked through the door, as if he disliked her this morning even more than he had yesterday. Sinew looked up from his gazette and nodded. Olga Ciavolga and Herro Dan glanced at each other, and an unspoken message seemed to pass between them.

  Goldie ate her way silently through a plateful of scones, and drank her chocolate, all the while watching the museum’s keepers out of the corner of her eye. She had never met people like them before. People who were bold enough to defy the Blessed Guardians. People who would carry a slaughterbird on their shoulder and think nothing of it. People who thought she might be useful . . .

  She waited for someone to explain to her what was going on. But no one said anything, so in the end she put down the scone she was about to eat, plucked up her courage and said, ‘What can I do to help my parents?’

  Sinew closed his gazette. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘A good question. What can you do?’ He pushed his plate away. ‘I’ll make some enquiries about your parents while I’m in the city today. And if I can get a message to them, I will.’

  A message! Goldie’s throat was suddenly tight. ‘Tell them— Tell them—’

  She couldn’t get the words out, but Sinew seemed to understand what she meant. He nodded. ‘I’ll meet you later with the news.’

  ‘You be careful, Sinew,’ said Herro Dan. ‘There’s Guardians and militia everywhere. Don’t you go takin’ unnecessary risks.’

  ‘Pfft! Listen to you!’ said Olga Ciavolga. ‘Life is a risk! Breathing is a risk! Have you forgotten that so easily? Does Sinew need someone to follow him around and keep him safe, like an infant?’

  ‘Unnecessary risks, I said. There’s a difference, and you know it.’

  The corner of Sinew’s mouth turned up. He bowed awkwardly to Herro Dan. ‘I’ll be careful,’ he said. Then he bowed to Olga Ciavolga. ‘But not too careful.’

  It was only after he had gone that Goldie realised he had not answered her question.

  ‘Now, child,’ said Olga Ciavolga, wiping her hands with a napkin. ‘Enough sitting around. It is time you learned more of the museum. Toadspit and I will take you to Harry Mount.’

  Harry Mount turned out to be a staircase. But it wasn’t the sort of staircase that was normally found in Jewel. Seen from below, it seemed to curl and twist dangerously, so that sometimes it hugged the wall and sometimes it looped out into mid-air and teetered there for a dozen steps before going back to its proper position.

  Broo was lying on the bottom step, with Morg perched on the banister above him. When the little dog saw Goldie he sprang up and danced around her, his tail wagging frantically. Goldie hesitated, then bent down and patted his head.

  ‘Come along,’ said Olga Ciavolga. ‘Harry Mount will not wait for us.’

  ‘Where are we going?’ said Goldie.

  ‘You will see, child.’

  No one spoke as they climbed the long staircase. They passed doorways in the walls, and high-ceilinged galleries thick with cobwebs. Dust rose in clouds around them with every step they took. Several times it seemed as if they must be nearly at the top, but then they rounded another curve and Goldie saw that the steps went up and up and up, steeper and steeper, until they disappeared in the gloom.

  Soon she was breathing hard. When they stopped on a landing, she sank down with a sigh of relief, her face damp with sweat. Toadspit and Olga Ciavolga sat on the stair above her.

  They had only been there for a minute or two when there was one of those disconcerting shifts. Without a word Olga Ciavolga and Toadspit stood up and began to climb the staircase again. Goldie scowled at their backs – why won’t they TELL me anything – and scrambled after them.

  She had not gone far when the little voice in the back of her mind whispered, Don’t trust your eyes.

  What?

  Don’t trust your eyes.

  What on earth did that mean? Goldie looked at the stairs. There didn’t seem to be anything wrong with them. She closed her eyes . . .

  She stopped.

  ‘What is it, child?’ said Olga Ciavolga.

  Goldie knew that if she was wrong Toadspit would sneer at her. So she turned her back on him and whispered, ‘Do you feel anything strange?’

  ‘Everything in the museum is strange,’ said Olga Ciavolga.

  Goldie bit her lip. ‘It— It looks like we’re going up Harry Mount. But when I close my eyes it doesn’t feel as if we’re going up. It feels as if we’re going down!’

  The old woman nodded approvingly and turned to Toadspit. ‘She feels it.’

  Toadspit looked annoyed, as if he had been hoping that Goldie wouldn’t feel it, whatever ‘it’ was.

  ‘That shifting feeling,’ said Goldie. ‘What is it? What does it mean?’

  Instead of answering her question, Olga Ciavolga said, ‘Can you whistle, child?’

  Goldie nodded. The old woman put her hand in her pocket and pulled out a large kerchief. It was set with sequins, and there were knots at each corner and around the edges. Olga Ciavolga untied the smallest knot.

  Immediately a breeze seemed to spring up out of nowhere. It lifted Goldie’s hair and ruffled Morg’s feathers. Olga Ciavolga pursed her lips and whistled three notes. The breeze disappeared, but on the steps above them the dust rose and swirled in mid-air before settling again.

  Goldie stared. ‘How did you do that?’

  Olga Ciavolga looked at Toadspit.

  ‘She’s a windspeaker,’ the boy muttered. ‘All the little winds, they tell her stuff.’

  ‘They are not always reliable,’ said Olga Ciavolga, ‘and there are places where they will not go. But in small ways they do my bidding.’

  She held out the kerchief. ‘You may try.’

  Why? thought Goldie. Why are you showing me this? But she took the kerchief and studied it curiously.

  The four knots at the corners were big, but the rest were small. Goldie touched one of the small ones. It hummed under her fingers – hrrrrrmmmmmm – and she jerked her hand away.

  ‘She won’t do it,’ said Toadspit. ‘She’s scared.’

  ‘We were all scared once,’ said Olga Ciavolga. Toadspit scowled and fell silent.

  Goldie touched the knot again. The humming wasn’t so bad now that she was expecting it. She dug her nails into the cloth and the knot came free. A breeze blew across her forehead. She whistled the three notes. The breeze tickled her ears, then disappeared. The dust rose and fell.

  ‘Soon those breezes will come back,’ said Olga Ciavolga, ‘and tell us if the way ahead is safe.’

  Goldie felt a lick of excitement. Just two days ago she hadn’t even been allowed to cross the road on her own. And now here she was, commanding the wind!

  ‘I want to do another one,’ she said, and she took hold of one of the big corner knots.

  ‘No!’ shouted Toadspit and Olga Ciavolga together.

  HRRRRRMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM! went the knot under Goldie’s fingers.

  It was so loud and fierce that she dropped the kerchief in fright. Olga Ciavolga caught it before it hit the ground.

  ‘That was stupid!’ said Toadspit. ‘That’s one of the Great Winds! You’re not allowed to even touch them!’

  ‘He is right,’ said Olga Ciavolga. ‘You cannot send the Great Winds to do your bidding. They go where they please and do what they wish. If a Great Wind is unleashed, it will destroy everything in its path. I have never untied one of them and I would not do so unless there was no other solution.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ mumbled Goldie.

  ‘There is no disgrace in learning,’ said Olga Ciavolga. ‘But caution is a good thing when you travel in the unknown.’

  She raised her head as if she was listening to something. Her grey hair lifted in the sudden breeze. She tied two small knots in her kerchief and the breeze disappeared.

  ‘I do not like where we are going,’ she said, ‘but both my wind and your wind tell me that there is no immediate danger.’<
br />
  She began to climb the staircase again, although really they were still going down. Toadspit hung back and whispered in Goldie’s ear, ‘Don’t start thinking you’re clever. It’s not your wind. It’s hers. They’re all hers. You don’t know anything.’

  Goldie stuck her tongue out at him and ran down the stairs after Olga Ciavolga.

  Now that Harry Mount had decided to take them down instead of up, it seemed in a hurry to get rid of them. The walls on either side began to draw in. They went around one more turn and the staircase ended abruptly.

  Goldie found herself on the threshold of a huge, dimly lit room. Brick arches loomed above her head, held up by great square pillars. Watergas lamps burned in small cages at the top of each arch. There was no floor. Instead, all Goldie could see were the wide dark waters of a lake that lapped at the pillars and at the bottom step of Harry Mount.

  ‘This,’ whispered Olga Ciavolga, ‘is Old Scratch. We will pass through here quickly. Do not speak unless you must.’

  There was a narrow brick ledge running around the edge of the lake. Broo stepped down onto it and sniffed at the dark water. The playfulness had completely gone out of him. He wagged his tail briefly and began to lead the way along the ledge.

  Toadspit went second, with Morg hunched on his shoulder. Then came Goldie and Olga Ciavolga. Water dripped from the ceiling and ran down the backs of their necks. The air was as cold as a winter’s night.

  They had not gone far when Broo stiffened and pricked up his ears. Morg bobbed her head from side to side as if she was trying to see through the gloom. They all stopped and listened.

  At first Goldie could hear nothing except the drip drip drip of the water, and a scratching sound from behind the nearest pillar. Then, far away across the cavern, something splashed. A second later, the water rose up like a black tongue and lapped at her feet.

  ‘Quickly!’ whispered Olga Ciavolga. ‘We must be gone from here!’

  Broo didn’t move. He stood staring out over the water, the hair on his back bristling. Toadspit stepped over him and Goldie followed. It was hard to hurry. The ledge was covered in green slime, and she was sure that if she went too fast she would slip.