Dark Water Breaking (Gunpowder & Alchemy Book 2)

by Dan Davis

Writer had been hoping they were too stupid to think of that. ‘I’m not asking for much,’ she said. ‘Just a small jug of water.’

  They looked at each other. ‘Stearne would do us in if we gave you water, love,’ said Malice. ‘Torture’s ain’t legal in England, right? So Stearne can’t do much to get a confession out of you but starve you and keep you awake and withhold your water and if we ruin his chances of that then we’d be for it. I’d like to help you, love, but it ain’t worth the risk.’

  ‘But how would he ever know?’ Writer asked. ‘I shall hide the jug. In the shelves, behind the records. He will never see it and he will never know.’

  They looked at each other again. ‘Just one jug of water?’

  They smuggled it into her cell just before full night had fallen. She had no idea how they did it but the lock had clanged, the door eased open and a scrawny hand placed a small stone jug of water inside before the door closed and the lock turned again.

  The night had been cold, so very cold that she had barely slept. It was not only the cold that kept her from peace. Throughout the night her captors had hammered their fists on her door many times. A faint grey shone through the window and outside the birds had sung their songs to welcome the dawn. Beyond the walls of the Guildhall she had heard the town of Morningtree awaken. She smelled smoke from kitchen fires. Hooves sounded on cobbles

  It had been a struggle to ignore both the world outside and the aches in her back and the cold seeping through to her bones. Under ordinary circumstances, such as when she had been in the tower, her ability to concentrate was exceptional, however after such a night her mind had become unfocused and prone to wandering. But she knew she must concentrate.

  Feel the water, she told herself. Feel the cold of it, the shape of the jug that held it.

  She felt the water in the jug move. A tiny part of her awareness was excited. She was aware of her thought, of thinking it is working! It popped into her mind before she could stop it. Thinking that thought made her almost break her concentration. Her mind wandered to the thought itself and because of that she lost the feeling of the water. But she relaxed and her mind flowed back to the jug and the water inside it sloshed. Somehow, she had made the water move; she had lifted some of it up. It felt as though her awareness, her sense of self, was pouring itself into the jug and with that feeling she urged it to lift up, just a few drops this time but she lifted them higher. Cracking open one eye to check, she saw a few thimbleful’s of water flowing up just a couple of inches in a low arc to fall back into the jug.

  A noise intruded. Ignore it, she thought. No; the noise was the clatter of boots on the tiled corridor outside. Someone was coming.

  The water splashed back into the jug, her concentration broken. She was on her feet before she was aware she was back in the room. The footsteps were louder. She grabbed the jug and shoved it into her prepared hiding place low on the shelves and yanked the scrolls across the gap.

  The footsteps stopped right outside her door. As keys jangled she gave the rest of the room a final look to make sure she had not forgotten anything.

  The floor was wet.

  A patch of black water on the pale flagstones. She quickly stood directly on the patch of water and forced herself to not look down at her boots to make sure she was indeed covering it.

  Stearne’s face was hideously ugly, twisted and angry as he yanked the door open.

  ‘Good day, witch,’ Stearne said, sneering. He turned and slammed the door. ‘You have a guilty look about you,’ Stearne said, peering down at her. ‘What you been up to, then?’

  Writer said nothing.

  Stearne hesitated, then shrugged. ‘I am come to hear your confession,’ he said. And, watching her closely, he peeled off the glove on his right hand to reveal it was made entirely of shining brass. The fingers were thin, almost like metal bones, but the ends had wide textured tips on them. The hand opened and closed in front of her face. ‘You will save us all a very great deal of time and effort, witch, if you confess to your crimes. We can dispense with all this nonsense.’ He gestured at the tiny room with his mechanical hand.

  Writer said nothing but she could not help staring at the shining metal that disappeared up Stearne’s sleeve.

  ‘You’re admiring an alchemist’s handiwork, there,’ he said, and laughed. ‘Cost me an arm and a leg, it did.’ He laughed again. The fingers on his brass hand flexed and curled as one as he turned and twisted it in the pale light.

  Writer did not laugh with him. ‘A very impressive device,’ she said, grudgingly. In truth, she was fascinated and wished to know every detail of how such a hand could be constructed to move in such a life-like fashion.

  ‘You ain’t seen the half of it, love’ Stearne said. ‘Treat yourself to a look at this.’ Stearne shrugged off his heavy black coat. Underneath he was wearing a poorly-patched waistcoat over a greasy white shirt with no sleeves. Writer was astonished to see that it was not just his hand but his entire right arm to the shoulder that was made of metal. It was a mass of parallel brass rods and shining wheels that whirred and spun when Stearne bent his metal arm at the elbow. ‘Alchemist’s magic tore the arm off above the elbow in a battle. Fitting that it was an alchemist who made me a new one.’

  ‘I’ve never seen the like,’ Writer said and she could no longer hide the fact that the arm truly was an impressive sight. Not in all the alchemist’s writings or drawings had she read or seen anything quite so complicated. Nor could she recall references to similar devices.

  ‘Nor would you,’ Stearne said. ‘The former Lord High Alchemist Dee made this. Hopkins captured him, has him slaving away in the Tower of London making cunning devices like this.’

  ‘How does it move, so?’ she asked.

  Stearne poked a finger into the upper arm and tapped on a thick brass tube in the centre. ‘Demon power,’ he said.

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Don’t understand it, myself,’ Stearne said. ‘But Dee said there’s a tiny demon trapped in a glass tube inside this brass case. The demon has some sort of power what makes it move.’

  ‘What’s a demon?’ the word sounded familiar.

  ‘Not sure,’ Stearne said. ‘Entity pulled from another world into this one and bound to my will, Dee said. Don’t mean nothing to me. All I know is the arm moves how I want it to move, most of the time. Bede ever have anything like this in his tower?’

  ‘You are attempting to get me to talk,’ she said, holding her chin up. He was a tall man but she was tall, too.

  Stearne grinned. ‘Not right away. You ain’t had long enough to get proper hungry. Proper thirsty. Proper tired, yet. When you do, you’ll not be giving me no lip. You’ll be meek as a kitten this time tomorrow. Then you’ll say anything for just a sip of water. Trust me, I done this a hundred times.’ He pulled his coat back on.

  She swallowed, her mouth already dry. Her throat already parched. She thought of the water in the shelves and licked her cracked lips. ‘And are you proud of yourself for that? For torturing people in this manner?’

  Stearne shrugged. ‘Don’t bother me none, no,’ he said. ‘Anyway, it ain’t me, is it. I just work for Hopkins. It’s him what gives the orders. I just do as I am told.’

  ‘Then I am afraid you are also pathetic,’ Writer said. ‘You are a moral weakling. You just do whatever you’re told and then you think that frees you from taking any responsibility for your actions.’

  ‘Too right,’ Stearne said, not smiling any longer. ‘Everyone does what they’re told, young lady. I was young, once. I might not have been an Alchemist’s pet like you, so I never had the words but I had your attitude, girl. The village alchemist telling me what was right, what was wrong, as if that drunken old fool knew anything about anything.’

  Writer sighed and crossed her arms. Stearne was trying to make her feel sorry for him but no doubt it was all lies.

  ‘I couldn’t wait until I was old enough to be away from my folks so I could do as I wanted.’ Stearne sno
rted out a laugh. ‘Fool that I was, I became a soldier. And armies are nothing but bosses all the way up. But when you lose an arm in the fighting they just drop you by the side of the road and march on. So I had to make do, by myself, with one arm and no trade but soldiering. What’s a man to do?’

  ‘Become a torturer,’ Writer said.

  ‘I did odd jobs,’ Stearne said. ‘Spent every penny I earned on wine and a room to sleep in. When there was no work I went hungry and slept in ditches. Sometimes soldiers would roust me out of my bed or my ditch or stop me on the road to see if I was a Royalist spy. But even a one-armed Stearne knows some tricks.’ He tapped the side of his nose with a brass finger and winked. ‘But one day I came to a place just outside your Vale to the south. There’s an inn there and in I went to look for work and wine. The owner was a man named Hopkins.’

  Writer held her tongue. It was strange that he was spinning this yarn for her but at least he was not asking her any questions. ‘Hopkins and me got on like a house on fire. Us and this young gentleman who was always whispering in Hopkins ear. Anyway, the young gentleman used his connections to get me into the Tower of London where alchemist fitted me this wonder of an arm. Soon I’ll have enough guineas to buy an inn of my own, one day. So, you tell me, girl, why on earth would I give up such a life when all I gots to do in return is torture a few innocent folk?’

  ‘Because it’s wrong,’ Writer said.

  ‘Not to me. Now, where’s the Alchemist Bede?’ Stearne spoke lightly but the sudden change in direction confused her for a moment.

  ‘Gone,’ Writer said. She did not want to admit to anything.

  ‘Gone where?’ Stearne said.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said, being sure to keep her facial expression totally neutral.

  ‘You’re a terrible liar,’ he said.

  ‘You’re a terrible man,’ she shot back.

  He threw his head back and laughed. ‘I am that, it is true,’ he said. ‘I don’t take no for an answer,’ Stearne said. ‘I have all day to ask you over and over. I guarantee you’ll break before I get bored.’

  ‘I am not answering your questions,’ Writer said. ‘You have no right to do this to me, to lock me up, to demand answers to your absurd questions. To deprive me of food and sleep. I shall say no more.’

  Stearne pointed at her with a brass finger. ‘You need another day and night without food or water, my girl.’ He grabbed his coat, banged on the door three times with his brass arm and stepped out. Stearne grinned as he slammed it shut. The lock clicked.

  Writer listened to the boot steps clattering away down the corridor. When they had gone, she pulled the jug from the hiding place, set it in its place on the floor and closed her eyes.

  Feel the water, she told herself.

  A Commotion at the Tower

  ‘What are they doing?’ Archer asked Weaver. The two of them were once again lying on the freezing ground at the edge of a field peering through the base of a hedgerow towards the Alchemist’s Tower. It stood before them on its rocky plinth, jutting into an ash-grey sky. The wind blew icy drizzle from the east and rustled the twigs over their heads.

  There were soldiers at the tower. They were dressed the same as the four that they had avoided on the road the day before. The four that had burned Cobnut House and stolen Owen and Ellen’s belongings. These new lot were doing stuff in the fields around the base of the plinth and more were up on the top of it at the base of the Tower. It was difficult to make out what they were up to but they seemed to be as busy as a nest of ants in spring.

  ‘How am I supposed to know what they’re doing?’ Weaver said. ‘You’ve got good eyes, ain’t you?’

  Archer squinted. The air between him and halfway to the Tower stilled. ‘They’re building things.’

  ‘They’re digging,’ Weaver said.

  Archer saw she had one hand pressed into the frozen ground and her eyes closed.

  ‘You’re using your ability,’ Archer said. ‘You’re feeling what they’re doing through the ground, aren’t you. That’s great, Weaver.’

  ‘Shut up,’ Weaver said, closing her eyes. ‘They’re hacking into the ground, I think.’

  ‘Why would they be doing that?’ Archer said, half to himself.

  ‘How am I supposed to know?’ Weaver said. ‘I can feel sort of banging and scraping through the ground but there’s no way to know why, you idiot.’

  ‘I was just thinking out loud,’ Archer said. ‘They must be trying to get into the Tower.’

  ‘They want the Alchemist’s stuff, the thieving scum,’ Weaver said. ‘They want to steal all his bits and bobs.’

  ‘What do you care if they do?’ Archer asked her.

  Weaver pointed through the tangled growth at the distant soldiers. ‘They’re outsiders, Archer. They don’t deserve to take his stuff,’ she said. ‘That should be our stuff. We defeated him, didn’t we? It’s ours more than it is theirs.’

  ‘They won’t get in anyway, will they?’ Archer said. ‘Not if it’s as hard to get into as it was to get out of.’

  ‘They’ve got picks and mattocks and spades and stuff.’ Weaver pursed her lips. ‘They could dig through the rock at the base, if they work at it hard enough, and come up through the well into the kitchen?’ She nodded towards the ones who were at the base of the plinth. They did seem to Archer to be doing things to the plinth with picks. Others seemed to be digging something like a ditch and throwing the earth on top to make a bank. But other soldiers up on the top seemed to be building something up there. A couple of them were standing back from the work and looking up toward the top, pointing and having a heated discussion.

  ‘Probably easier to climb up the side of the Tower,’ Archer pointed to the figures. ‘I bet that’s what they’re up to.’

  ‘Too high,’ Weaver said. ‘Might as well just kill yourself as climb up that.’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about how we could get back up there, if we needed to.’ He felt pleased with himself and he wanted Weaver to ask him what his idea was so that he could show how clever he was.

  ‘Yeah, and I’m sure you’re going to tell me so just spit it out.’ Weaver was quite difficult to impress, he remembered.

  ‘The same way we got out,’ he said. ‘By balloon.’

  Weaver fixed her green eyes on him with a contemptuous stare. ‘You remember what happened last time you got us to fly in a balloon? You couldn’t control where we went. You couldn’t even make us go down. We floated into that stupid magic storm and if we hadn’t crashed into that tree we’d have been killed dead. And you want to do it again? You’re mad.’

  ‘I know what I did wrong last time,’ he said, embarrassed. ‘If we tie the balloon to the ground with a long rope we could float up above the top of the tower and pull ourselves on to the roof.’

  ‘We’d need Burp in the balloon, though,’ Weaver said, thoughtfully. ‘Burp is already twice as big as when we did it last time and he’d never fit in the basket, would he. And anyway, the basket what used to be the Alchemist Bede is miles and miles away deep in the Moon Forest underneath that giant beech tree. Probably rotten by now but even if it ain’t, how are you going to bring it here?’

  ‘We could get a new basket made.’ He reached up and shook a hazel branch by his head. ‘Plenty of basket weaving material. You could weave us a basket in no time, I bet.’

  ‘I ain’t never weaving nothing again my whole life, mate,’ Weaver said.

  ‘And I’m sure Keeper could think of a way to build a fire that could be contained in the basket, somehow,’ Archer said, ignoring her.

  ‘You and your ideas.’ Weaver laughed. ‘You try to be clever like Writer but you’re just an idiot.’

  Archer was offended that she had ridiculed his ideas and he didn’t know what to say. He didn’t think he was an idiot though.

  ‘So what do we do about this lot?’ Weaver asked.

  ‘We haven’t got time spare to do anything,’ Archer said. ‘Writer needs us, that’s
why we’re out here in the first place, isn’t it? Come on, let’s go.’

  ‘No,’ Weaver said. Her fingers curled into the spindly grass. ‘We can’t just let them break in and steal everything that should be ours. What if there’s something in there that we need to save Writer? And we can’t because those soldiers have pilfered it all?’ She clawed out a handful of dark earth.

  Archer thought about it. There were over a dozen men over there. A dozen soldiers. A dozen men like Pym. He didn’t think him and Weaver would have had a chance with the four of them on the road and they certainly wouldn’t be able to challenge more. ‘I don’t think we would be able to stop them, anyway.’

  ‘It shouldn’t be them doing this. They didn’t earn it. They’re going to strip the place bare.’ Weaver sort of growled and punched a fist into the cold earth, hard. ‘I wish we could bury them.’

  The ground beneath them rumbled and shook and there was a shocking great bang. A huge plume of dirt and stones shot up into the sky right in front their hedgerow. It sprayed up and up into the air like a cloud of smoke. Archer cried out in fear and covered his head with his arms. Little stones and dirt rained down from above, spattering about them. Stones thwacked him all over his body. Then it stopped. Archer uncurled himself and a few more stones smacked down into him.

  Weaver was likewise unfurling herself beside him. She looked as shocked as he felt.

  ‘What did you do?’ he cried.

  ‘I didn’t do it on purpose,’ she shouted back at him.

  They both climbed to their feet, dusting themselves off. ‘What happened?’ he said, realising he was shouting. ‘How did you do that, Weaver?’ His ears were ringing and he shook lumps of freezing mud from his hair.

  ‘Don’t know, do I?’ Weaver yelled. Her eyes were glowing green. ‘I was just angry at them. I felt like hurting them, I was thinking I could take them down. I lost control.’

  ‘How can you lose control that much?’ Archer shouted.

  ‘At least I know what control is,’ she shouted back and stepped right up to his face, nose to nose. ‘You’re the one who’s all or nothing. All you can do is make a storm wind. You can’t even control your arrows properly.’