by F. D. Lee
It occurred to Bea that if she stayed any longer she was going to cry. She abandoned her wine and stood up to leave, when the doors were pushed open and a group of fae tumbled up to the bar.
Normally this wouldn’t have had any effect on the other customers, but there was an air around the group that seemed to radiate danger. Perhaps it was something in the way they moved, or in their tone of voice. But it was probably the fact they were loudly singing the old songs, and that the ring-leader was a young elf, still beautiful despite his matted hair and filthy clothing.
“A man of words and not of deeds,” they sang, “Is like a garden full of weeds, and when the weeds begin to grow, it’s like a garden full of snow…”
Bea put her glass down carefully, her eyes fixed on the gang, who had got their drinks and were waving them to the tune of their forbidden song. In addition to the scraggy elf there were a couple of imps, a gnome and two pretty adhenes, who were giggling maniacally and flicking their long hair over their shoulders in a way that managed to accentuate their slender necks and petite frames.
“And when the bird away does fly, it's like an eagle in the sky, and when the sky begins to roar, it's like a lion at the door…”
The whole bar had dimmed to a murmur, all eyes on the group.
“And when the door begins to crack, it's like a stick across your back, and when your back begins to smart, it's like a penknife in your heart…”
Bea stood up slowly and walked towards the door. She was nearly there when the elf shouted across the room.
“Wherefore are you leaving, sister?” He said the word ‘sister’ in a manner not inclined toward familial good feeling.
Bea swore under her breath, but she turned around. “I’m going home. I’m tired.”
The elf stepped forward, looking her up and down. His pretty lip curled.
“And when your heart begins to bleed, you're dead, and dead, and dead indeed,” he sang softly.
“I’m just going home,” Bea repeated. She could feel the pull of the door behind her, so close she only had to turn around and take a couple of steps. But elves were fast, and Bea knew without needing to be told that he would like it if she had her back turned.
“Marry, sister,” the elf spoke softly, but the bar was so quiet everyone could hear him easily, “are you not going to dance with me?”
Bea took a step backwards.
“By the moon, you are afeared!” the elf laughed, stepping further into the room. The adhenes squealed in delight behind him. “I shouldn’t expect more from you, servant of Titania. Yea, you sneer at me for saying what’s true. Mayhap we shall discover if dirt doth grow behind your ears…”
He stepped towards Bea, his lovely face warped by the cruel smile stretched across it. Bea did the only thing she could.
She hit him.
The elf fell to the floor.
For once, Bea was grateful she was a garden fairy. Cabbage fairies were built sturdy and strong, and Bea hadn’t felt the need to pull her punch. She realised too late her bag had fallen off her shoulder, spilling her Book. She grabbed it and held it tightly in her arms.
“Hark, friends. She does not want to dance with me, for I am not bound to her master,” the elf said, climbing to his feet, talking to the room. Even wiping black blood from his face, he managed to be beautiful. “Look you at this serf, this slave, this whore of the General Administration.” He turned back to Bea. “Without your kind I’d be free – we’d all be free.” His voice grew louder as he realised that the majority of the room were nodding along with him. Someone, hidden in the safety of a dark corner, shouted, “Hear, hear”.
Bea turned around and dived for the door.
“Aye, run away! You cannot stop it! The 8th Chapter is dying!” the elf cried, banging his fist into the palm of his hand, overtaken by his own rhetoric. “Long live the story! Long live the story! Long live the story!”
The other fae took up the chant, and the last thing Bea saw was the elf jumping up onto a table, fist raised to the ceiling, mouth open wide as he decried the Teller and the GenAm.
Chapter Thirteen
Bea had barely slept the night before, but she was far from tired.
She had instead spent most of the night planning how to get back on Plot and wondering exactly how far it was she was prepared to go in order to see it done – a question which, alarmingly, she was still no closer to answering.
What she needed was information. If she could find out what tribe this strange, hooded man came from she might be able to do something about him. At the very least she’d know what he was capable of.
Mistasinon hadn’t been any help at all, but Bea conceded he’d tried to cheer her up, and he did seem to genuinely think she could work a Plot. And the incident in the bar had shown her that he was right to be worried about the Mirrors. She didn’t want to let him down any more than herself. So she’d decided to try another avenue.
She put on her dress and brushed her grey hair until it shone like silver. Finally, she applied a touch more make-up a little more carefully than usual. She was about as ready as she’d ever be.
She walked down the crooked stairs to the ground floor of her building, took a deep breath, and stepped into the reception.
Ivor was sat where he always was, playing a complicated game involving a gridded board and little round disks made of bone. Bea never knew which Kingdom he got these games from. She suspected even Ivor didn’t know, and that he made up the rules to suit himself. Like most of the fae, his life had become crushingly mundane since The Great Redaction and the introduction of the Plots. And yet, again like most of the fae, he was too terrified of the Teller to rebel. He was, quite simply, trapped.
Bea reminded herself of all this as he looked up and gave her a dirty brown smile, as if he hadn’t simply watched her being dragged off by the GenAm to a fate only mortal gods’ knew what.
“Thought we’d lost you,” he said with something approaching real warmth.
“Would you have missed me?” she asked, trying her best to purr.
Ivor shot her a puzzled look. “You got a cold coming on? And what’s all that muck on your face?”
Bea flopped down onto one of the stools that lined the counter, defeated. She had heard once that all women had in their possession the weapon of their sex. She wondered if whoever had said that had ever tried to launch said sexuality at a gnome. She suspected not.
“I’ve got a new story. A Plot actually,” she offered in explanation. Ivor looked her up and down, his face drawn in an expression that showed it was clear that he was reluctant to receive her elucidation.
“And that’s part of your uniform, is it?”
“I just thought it’d be nice.”
“Hum,” Ivor hummed, turning back to his game.
“Actually, I was wondering if I could ask your advice?”
Ivor looked up from his board. “You want advice from me?”
“If you don’t mind,” Bea answered, trying to appear casual.
Ivor tapped the tile in his hand against his muddy teeth, weighing up joys of being able to condescend against the dangers of being asked something he didn’t know the answer of.
“I really can’t think of anyone else to ask,” Bea said, “if you don’t mind, that is. I know you’re busy.”
Bea and Ivor tried hard to ignore the almost ceremonial stillness that permeated the reception of the dirty boarding house.
“Yeah, well,” Ivor coughed, “what y’wanna know?”
“I wanted to ask you about a man.”
The gnome leered. He had a face written for lewdness, and to date he’d had very little chance to avail Bea of what was his pièce de résistance. He now revelled in his opportunity, and with good cause. Every part of his face was incorporated: his bushy, tangled eyebrows jumped up and down on his forehead like a cat dancing on hot coals; his yellowing eyes darted left and right in their sockets; his lips pulled back over his brown, pitted teeth in what was the worst
smile Bea would ever experience.
“Men, is it? You wanna know what to do with one in the morning?”
“No, thank you,” Bea answered firmly. “I met this man the other day. I think he’s one of the fae, but I didn’t recognise him from any of the tribes I know.”
“And you want t’see him again, that it?”
“I’d certainly like to know what to expect if I do.”
Ivor pulled on his teeth, thinking. “If you didn’t recognise him why d’you think he’s one of the fae?”
“Intuition?” Bea said hopefully. If she gave too much away Ivor would work out she was asking about someone who was quite likely an Anti, and then the best Bea could hope for would be that he would evict her – more probably he’d report her.
She held her breath while the gnome eyeballed her.
“Don’t put much stock in all that stuff meself, but alright,” he said after a moment. “You’d better tell me what you can.”
Bea breathed again.
“There’s not much. I didn’t see his face or anything. But he was tall, strong. I think he was wearing jewellery, or possibly some kind of plate. Something that made a noise when he moved. And he spoke strangely. Like from the old stories, the banned ones.”
Ivor scratched his chin. “S’not a lot to be going on. If he speaks funny might be he’s been off on a long Plot.”
“It’s more than that, but I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Go on.”
Bea licked her lips. This was the moment. If she said this wrong…
“When he spoke, he made me want things. Things only he could give me. Not sex,” she said, seeing the look Ivor’s face. “Other things.”
The gnome picked his nose thoughtfully.
“There’s not many as I can remember like that. It rings a bell, though. There used t’be a group of fair folk who could make the characters trust ’em, believe in ’em… long time ago.”
“What happened to them?”
“What do you think? They got Redacted. What’s all this about? I ain’t gonna risk a visit from the Beast for you, missus.”
Bea picked up one of the tiles from the board and spun it on the counter top, trying to think what to say when inspiration struck.
“How about a game? A game’s just a game. No rules against games.”
Ivor’s mouth twitched. “You know I love a game.”
“A guessing game?”
“Alright. Old house rules. Three guesses.”
“Naturally. So, number one. I reckon that these fae, the ones who make the characters believe, I reckon they were very powerful? Famous?”
Ivor glared at her, angry to have been so easily tricked into continuing the conversation. But rules was rules. “Dunno, really. Don’t remember. But even if they were, they ain’t now. They don’t fit the rules.”
“Alright. Second guess. You said they could make the characters believe, so shouldn’t their stories still be popular?”
“Dunno about that,” Ivor said sullenly. “Belief weren’t always in something popular, nor in something nice. That was the whole problem, weren’t it? The stories got too close to the bone, and the characters turned to their machines instead of to us. Anyway, this is all before The Great Redaction.”
“Alright, final guess. You know more than you’re telling me?”
Ivor squealed with delight. “Stupid girl – you wasted that guess! Course I know more than I’m telling you. There’s your answer. Now the game’s done and you can go bother someone else.”
Bea swallowed her disappointment and got up to leave.
“Why d’you really wanna know all this, anyway? You never shown any interest in a man before, least not for long. Who’s this one to you?” Ivor asked, magnanimous in victory.
“It’s nothing. I just… he might be important. To my story. I’m sure I won’t see him again, anyway. I’ll see you later.”
And then something very strange happened.
“Here, hang on, girl. I got some post for you,” Ivor said, head bobbing on his shoulders like a chicken’s.
“Post? But you don’t collect our letters.”
“Just started, just started this week. Ain’t you read the notice?”
“What notice?”
“Stupid fairy, never paying attention,” he continued at top volume, diving under the counter. Bea heard him scrabbling about.
“What are you talking about?”
Ivor reappeared, a crumpled piece of paper in his hand. He shoved it at Bea.
“There. Your post,” he said again, now adding a wink to the waggling of his eyebrows.
“Oh? Right. Yes. My post. Thanks.”
“Now get lost. Can’t you see I’m busy?” Ivor snapped, returning to his lonely game.
Bea walked out of the building, the crumpled paper held tight in her fist. The streets were at that strange neither-nor time when last night’s revellers were crawling home to their beds and the morning workers were crawling out of them. More often than not it was the same bed, Ænathlin being a city of opportunity; in this case the opportunity to share lice.
She unfolded the paper Ivor had given her and looked down at his spidery handwriting.
“D(2)1-102.”
Bea frowned, recognising the shorthand for the 2nd Chapter.
She, like most of the fae, didn’t really know anything about the very early Chapters. The GenAm controlled the histories, and most fae only really knew about Oberon and Titania’s Chapter, which was the 7th, and the Teller’s, which was the 8th and current Chapter. She wondered if she could go back and try and find a way to get the gnome to explain, but she knew he wouldn’t.
The note fluttered softly in the palm of her hand. She tore it into tiny pieces of confetti and dropped them into a puddle of acrid yellow liquid, watching them dissolve slowly.
Chapter Fourteen
Sindy sat in her room, brushing her hair and watching through her window as Will dug up the garden.
She liked watching Will. She’d known him all her life. He was friendly and familiar and kind. He didn’t lose his temper and he always listened to her chatter about the things she liked to talk about. He and Sindy just seemed to understand each other, which was more than she could say for the rest of the people she met.
Sindy was beginning to have very unkind thoughts about the people that made up her immediate universe. The type of thoughts that made her feel mildly ashamed, and then annoyed with herself. Why shouldn’t she be cross – no, no, pissed off, thank you – with everything? But Sindy couldn’t help it. She didn’t like arguments or confrontation, even though she knew she probably should stand up for herself a little more.
Take her stepsister, for example. She was so passionate about things. It didn’t seem to matter what the thing was, somehow Ana always managed to find a way to make a fight out of it.
Sindy could remember when Ana and her mum had moved in. She’d wanted to make a good impression on her new family, so she’d spent hours in the kitchen, making a lovely roast dinner. She had dug up all the vegetables herself, killed and plucked the chicken and had, after hours of hard work, produced a meal fit for a king.
But Ana had taken one look at it, told Sindy off for wasting perfectly good food (there was no need, she’d said, to have all those vegetables and both roast potatoes and roast parsnips) and then announced she was vegetarian and told Sindy off again for cruelty to animals.
Sindy had tried to see Ana’s point of view, but she didn’t think she had been wasteful or cruel to the chicken. She had fed it and watered it and looked after it all its life, and now it was its turn to feed her. She thought that was fair, not cruel. And her dad had always loved her roasts, although he had sat there quietly while Ana scolded her, doing nothing.
Sindy had wanted to cry but knew she shouldn’t make a fuss. Everything had changed. Her dad had remarried, and he hadn’t even asked her what she thought about it. He had just come home one day and told her he’d met someone, a
nd she would soon have a new mother and sister. Sindy had thought that was unfair, but she’d never said anything about it.
She watched as Will went to the shed to get the small hoe. Everything was certainly a lot simpler with Will. He often came over in the evenings, since his own family had been taken by the ’enza. He’d survived, but at the age of fifteen had found himself alone in the world. Sindy admired that in him. She thought it was awful he had lost his mum and dad and brother all at once. He must be very lonely in their little house. He was quite possibly the bravest person she had met, and so when she felt sad or lonely she would try to be like Will.
He had found her the night Ana had moved in, in the kitchen by herself, cleaning up all her hard work. She’d been trying to sing a song, because her mum had told her once a happy song meant a happy heart. But she hadn’t been happy, and every time she opened her mouth she’d had to bite back the tears.
Will had sung along with her and made her laugh. He helped her wash up and clear away, and valiantly stepped in and ate both chicken legs and taken some home for sandwiches.
So Sindy liked Will very much. He was simple and friendly and he didn’t make her feel ashamed or angry or helpless. He wasn’t a very rich man, and she supposed he wasn’t very handsome. But then she wasn’t rich, and everyone said she was pretty but it didn’t seem to make her any happier, so what did that matter?
Sindy was pulled out of her thoughts by a knock at the door. Her father was at work, her stepmother in bed with her nerves, and Ana was with her friends in the woods. Ana was rarely at home. She said that sitting doing nothing was an insult to the thousands of slaves forced to toil for hours every day in the underground manufactories in Cerne Bralksteld.
Sindy liked it when Ana said things like that, as it was clearly aimed at their mother, a woman for whom the merest thought of lifting a finger brought on a bout of nervous indigestion and necessitated a long sleep. Sometimes Ana was alright.
