Time of Trial

by Michael Pryor

  ‘Right. Let’s stay together. As close as possible.’

  ‘Aubrey.’

  ‘It was your idea.’

  She sighed. ‘The corridor is now going both ways. Choose a direction.’

  The archway now opened onto a corridor that stretched into dim distance, both right and left. Both directions were identical – duplicates of the prison corridor, disappearing into infinity. He cocked his head but all he could hear was a thin whistling. Wind? A drift of scent came to him, alternating between dank and dusty, as if it couldn’t make up its mind. Or as if it were being made up on the spot. ‘I don’t think it matters.’

  ‘Right is right, then.’

  Ten

  Garoline marched off, and Aubrey had to hurry to catch up.

  ‘Can you do anything?’ Caroline asked him when he’d reached her. ‘Anything magical. Can you find them? Or can you stop this place getting us as well? Either would be useful. Both would be best.’

  ‘Ah, yes. Of course.’ He walked with arms behind his back, chewing his lip. ‘Do you have anything belonging to George or von Stralick?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Neither do I. There goes any hope of using a location spell.’

  ‘Perhaps you should list the other spells you can’t do, to save time thinking about them.’

  ‘I have another idea.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  Aubrey cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted. ‘George!’

  The corridor echoed beautifully and his voice rolled away into the distance. ‘Simple. Straightforward. Direct.’

  ‘And not terribly effective. I don’t hear any answers.’

  ‘That’s because you’ve given up too early. We have to keep trying.’

  So they pressed on, along the hypnotically straight corridor, shouting and listening, shouting and listening, until their voices were hoarse. Eventually, he leaned against the cool stone of the wall and held up a hand. ‘Rest stop. Please.’

  Caroline nodded, absently. ‘Perhaps they went the other way. We should go back.’

  ‘Or they might be just ahead and we should go on.’

  Caroline consulted her wrist watch. She was one of the few females of Aubrey’s acquaintance who carried a watch, and the only one whose watch was a wrist watch. She did have most elegant wrists, he decided, and it did suit her.

  She saw him looking at her. ‘We’ve been going for fifteen minutes.’

  ‘It seems longer.’ Aubrey rubbed the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. Then he frowned and took another. ‘Can you smell that?’

  Caroline studied him, judged that he wasn’t joking, then sniffed, delicately. ‘Bread. Freshly baked. And bacon.’

  Aubrey wet a finger and held it up. ‘It’s coming from up ahead.’

  ‘Mmm. Smells like heaven.’

  Aubrey went to set off then froze, mid-step. ‘That’s what I’m afraid of.’

  Caroline looked at him with alarm, and he took it as a good reason to look back – which he enjoyed. Then she shook her head with exasperation. ‘Can’t you keep your mind on our task?’

  ‘Of course. Sorry.’

  Which he was. And wasn’t. And he didn’t know quite what to say about his most mixed of mixed feelings, so he lurched off in a random direction, away from her.

  Suddenly, a wave of dizziness struck him and he had to reach out and steady himself against the wall. It was as if his sense of perspective had undulated for an instant, the entire corridor swelling like a balloon before snapping back into place.

  Caroline’s face was pale.

  ‘You felt it too?’ he asked.

  She nodded. ‘Something changed.’

  Aubrey looked back the way they had come, but the corridor was the same as before. He thought about taking a few steps in that direction to find out if they’d passed through something unseen, but the queasiness in his stomach convinced him otherwise. Besides, the smell of freshly baked bread still beckoned.

  Ahead, the corridor looked indistinct, slightly misty. ‘Do you see that?’

  ‘It’s wavery. Foggy.’

  ‘Press on or turn back?’

  ‘I say we press on.’

  ‘Very well.’ Shoulder to shoulder, they edged forward. Aubrey could feel the magic on all sides, the subtle background prickling that reminded him that they were inside a pearl.

  The corridor rippled again and this time all its dimensions wavered. Height, width and depth stretched and contracted all at once in a movement that made him sick to his stomach, so offensive was it to his innate notion of the solidity of things. Like most people, he’d grown up accepting that buildings just don’t warp themselves at random. Dizziness piled on top of his nausea, so much so that he stumbled and clutched at Caroline’s arm, but she was quicker and had already gripped his hand. He had the profound sense of a dream transition, where one moment he’d be in a classroom but then a sudden shift would find him in a park, all without any real in-between state.

  ‘Aubrey.’ Caroline’s grip on his hand was almost painful, but no force in the world would have made him relinquish it. The contact meant nothing, he knew that, apart from the natural human desire for comfort when in danger. But he wasn’t going to be the first one to let go.

  They found themselves in a gallery, a rectangular walkway looking down on a well-lit room. He took a deep breath. ‘All right, so we’re somewhere else now.’

  ‘I’m glad you said that,’ Caroline whispered. ‘I thought I might have been dreaming.’

  Aubrey clutched an ornately carved pillar nearby with his free hand, partly for extra steadiness, and partly to reassure himself that this place was real and solid. Insofar as that means anything around here, he thought.

  Another deep breath. He did his best to take in the new surroundings, nailing down the new reality through empirical observation, doing his best to be a rational, intelligent being.

  Four doors, evenly spaced, opened onto the gallery, halfway along each side. They were elegantly set with six glass panes, ruby red. Aubrey nominated the doors as north, south, east and west and felt better for it. The orientation had a settling effect.

  A waist-high rail ran around the gallery. It was a rich, red-brown wood, polished smooth. He ran a hand along it and enjoyed the satin touch. The rail surmounted a carved wooden screen made of the same red-brown wood. It was a repeating vegetative pattern, undulating vines alternating with large rosettes.

  When Aubrey leaned over the rail he was looking down on a library. The room was lined with bookshelves. Two long tables – covered with books – were arranged in the middle of the room, running along the long axis. A chair stood with each table, while a large red leather armchair took up most of the gap between one of the tables and the north end of the room.

  The room smelled of leather and paper, with just a hint of dust. It was the perfect place to enjoy a book, Aubrey decided. Quiet, comfortable, a place to immerse oneself in the world of the written word.

  Which is what Hugo von Stralick was doing. With every appearance of bliss, he was reading, standing in front of a wall of books and sampling them with an expression of deep and utter contentment.

  It would have been a restful sight, but Aubrey stared, disbelieving, because von Stralick was moving like lightning, picking up books, flicking pages, replacing and extracting another, every movement done with supernatural rapidity.

  Agog, Aubrey watched while the Holmland spy sped through a green-bound book he’d plucked from the shelves only seconds earlier. His face was both thoughtful and delighted as he read, his eyes flicking from side to side, his fingers turning pages almost in a blur. His other hand was holding open the gap on the shelf, obviously where the book had come from, with the intention of returning it to its space soon.

  Von Stralick was browsing, but it was the browsing of a creature made of pure speed. In seconds, he’d worked his way through a dozen books.

  Aubrey met Caroline’s wonder-filled eyes. ‘What on earth...?’ she said
before words failed her.

  ‘Magic,’ Aubrey said simply. The magical power of their prison was propelling von Stralick at breakneck speed. Aubrey shook his head. No, that wasn’t right. Von Stralick didn’t seem strained or hurried. He was simply moving at a different rate. A phenomenally faster rate.

  Aubrey gnawed at a lip. Or could it be that time itself was moving at a different rate down there?

  He hissed as the implications hit him. If time were speeding away, how much time did von Stralick have left?

  ‘Hugo,’ Aubrey called, but von Stralick didn’t look up. With eye-watering swiftness, he simply nodded and chuckled – high-pitched – before replacing a fat book. Immediately, he sought another, a slim black volume.

  Aubrey called again, but von Stralick was oblivious. ‘He’s either gone deaf or...’

  ‘He can’t hear,’ Caroline finished. ‘What’s he doing here? And what happened to the food smells?’

  ‘Food?’ Aubrey sniffed. ‘It’s gone.’

  ‘Library smell only.’ Caroline dropped his hand, causing him a momentary pang, and leaned over the railing. ‘Let’s go down and see what’s going on.’

  ‘It would help if there were a staircase.’

  Caroline straightened. ‘Ah. Rather a glaring omission.’

  ‘It seems as if we’re not meant to get down there.’

  ‘Well, if there’s no stairway, we’ll have to find another way down.’ She frowned slightly as she measured the drop by eye. ‘It’s not that far. Twenty feet from this rail. Less from the floor.’

  ‘It’s too far to jump.’ Aubrey drummed his fingers on the rail and hummed a little. ‘I don’t suppose there are any bed sheets lying around? Nothing we could tie together to lower ourselves down?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Didn’t think so. So perhaps it might be better to attract his attention.’ He bent and unlaced a boot. ‘I’m sure he won’t be able to ignore this.’

  ‘I’m glad you wore your good socks.’

  ‘Socks?’ He looked down. ‘So that’s where they went.’

  ‘Aubrey.’

  ‘Of course. I’ll get on with it.’ He hefted his boot, measured the distance, paused for dramatic effect, then threw it at von Stralick.

  The boot sailed in an arc, but Aubrey’s jaw dropped when, mid-way and in mid-air, it bounced once, then settled, bobbing slightly like a cork on a pond, well above von Stralick’s head.

  Caroline tutted. ‘I don’t think you should try the other boot, not even for balance.’

  ‘Right. Good idea.’ Trying to make sense of this impossible spectacle, Aubrey leaned over the rail. He grunted, reaching down as far as he could, but couldn’t feel anything. He straightened and then went to climb over the rail.

  Caroline put her hands on her hips. ‘What on earth are you doing?’

  ‘Testing. I need more data, more observations before I can work out what’s going on.’

  ‘It’s something invisible, something that’s keeping us from von Stralick and something unknown. Isn’t that enough?’

  ‘It’s a good start, but I need more.’

  Aubrey stepped over the rail, balanced on the narrow ledge, held onto the rail with both hands and stretched out a foot – his booted foot.

  Ah.

  Not far below the level of the gallery he struck a surface. It was spongy and giving, like a balloon filled with water. He pressed, and his foot sank. He pressed harder and the invisible material resisted, pushing him back.

  ‘I wonder if he can even see us,’ Aubrey muttered, while eyeing his boot, stranded in the middle of the unseen barrier. Von Stralick looked as if he was trapped in a bubble – a bubble where time flowed differently.

  And if he spends much longer in it, Aubrey thought, he’ll start to age. With a growing hollowness in his chest, he wondered how long a lifespan was in such a place. It must be shorter, but how short? Sylvia had mentioned others, but had also mentioned that they had worn out...

  Caroline helped him scramble back over the rail. ‘It’s as if he’s on display.’ She gazed around the gallery. ‘Like a zoo.’

  ‘Mmm. For Sylvia?’

  ‘She’s the only one here. I have the impression that this whole place is for her benefit.’

  ‘To spy on someone in a library?’ Aubrey rubbed his temples. ‘It seems rather excessive.’

  ‘Craddock and Tallis would love a facility like this. If they could observe suspects in their normal surroundings, they might learn a thing or two.’

  ‘Learn a thing or two.’

  ‘Aubrey, when you repeat my words like that, it means I’ve said something that made you think.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘If so, and if you come up with something clever, I want to register that I was the one who started the whole thing.’

  ‘Done. Due credit will be given to you in the playbill when this little drama hits the stage. “From an original idea by the redoubtable Caroline Hepworth.” ’

  ‘Redoubtable.’ Caroline flashed a quick smile. ‘I like that. It makes a change from “capable” or “competent”.’

  Aubrey had a thousand other words he could use to describe Caroline, but he refrained, lest she see that his feelings hadn’t disappeared. They were hidden, put aside, honouring her request to stay at arm’s length.

  The sudden opening of the gallery’s north door made Aubrey whirl. He felt absurdly vulnerable, with one boot on, one boot off. So it was with relief that he realised that it was the wraith-like Sylvia who was drifting through the doorway.

  She glanced mildly at von Stralick, who was so absorbed in a weighty volume that he turned the pages only every few seconds, then she walked slowly toward Aubrey and Caroline. ‘You found him,’ she said, with the barest trace of surprise. Aubrey realised that this was her way. She had ghosts of emotion, hints, suggestions, nothing that took hold of her, no passion or intensity – apart from the memory of her brother.

  ‘I watch them,’ she said, interrupting his thoughts. ‘My guests. I watch them once they’re appropriately housed.’

  Aubrey studied her face. It moved in slight, hesitant ways, as if feelings were strangers.

  ‘What about us?’ Caroline said.

  ‘Oh, you’ll be housed soon. Don’t worry.’

  Aubrey swallowed. ‘In a library?’

  ‘That’s his dream, not yours.’ Sylvia lay a finger along her cheek. ‘I suppose you could end up in a library, but it would be different. Yours, not his.’

  Caroline stiffened. ‘Are you saying that you’ll put us somewhere like von Stralick? But it will be our dream?’

  ‘So it seems.’ A suggestion of an anxious frown flitted across Sylvia’s mask-like face but it evaporated in an instant. ‘I don’t do anything, you know. I just watch. It’s hard to learn when I don’t have anyone to watch.’

  ‘Wait,’ Caroline said. ‘You’re learning? Learning what?’

  A flicker of confusion crossed Sylvia’s face before she was, once again, serene. ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘Von Stralick,’ Aubrey said, pointing. ‘What’s he doing?’

  ‘What he likes to do, what he does best.’

  Aubrey was surprised. He hadn’t imagined von Stralick’s idea of heaven was being surrounded by books. ‘Does he know you’re watching?’

  ‘No. He thinks it’s real.’

  ‘Like a convincing dream,’ Aubrey said. Caroline glanced at him. She could see the danger, too. ‘So we’ll be in a place like that, unaware that it’s not real, and just going about our business for your entertainment.’

  A hint of shock; her hand almost went to her mouth before it dropped, once again, to her side. ‘No. Not entertainment. Learning.’

  It was Caroline who leaped to the conclusion this time. ‘And his life goes faster in there, the better for you to watch and learn?’

  Sylvia peered over the rail, her expression dreamy. ‘It appears so. It gets faster, too. Especially toward the end.’

  Aubrey wasn’t
enchanted by this. ‘You said you had other ... visitors. Ones who aren’t here now. They were in places like this?’

  ‘Not libraries,’ Sylvia murmured. She rested her chin on one hand as she propped an elbow on the rail. ‘I remember one was in a laboratory, a magical laboratory. She loved it. Another, one of my favourites, was living in a forest among the pines.’

  ‘They’re gone.’ Caroline’s face was determined, but Aubrey could see that the ghastly fate of those who had gone before was haunting her.

  He found he had to steel himself as well, and he concentrated on noting how callous Dr Tremaine was, how careless of the lives of others. He had some sympathy for Sylvia’s plight, and he’d even thought he’d detected Dr Tremaine’s humanity in trying to save her – but in the end he was essentially as selfish as ever. He’d sacrifice others without a thought to achieve his ends.

  And you’re preparing to sacrifice Sylvia to serve your ends, a voice whispered. Are you so different?

  He shook his head. Conscience. Imagination mixed with empathy.

  ‘Gone,’ Sylvia murmured. ‘One day, they were near their end, and the next I couldn’t find them or their happy place.’

  Aubrey had a new definition of nightmare. Trapped in a make-believe place, imprisoned but never knowing it. But his inner contrariness pointed out that being granted heaven couldn’t be a bad thing...

  Living a hoax would be, though, Aubrey thought and he shuddered, thinking of the ant farm he’d kept as a young lad. The ants had been well fed and watered and he had watched their busy industry for hours, convinced that they were much better off than they would be out in the wild.

  Unfeeling manipulation. It was an easy frame of mind to slip into, and rewarding in its sense of power. Aubrey vowed never to succumb to it.

  ‘Where’s George?’ he asked Sylvia. ‘And how do we get them out of here?’

  ‘Get them out?’ She looked at him as if he’d asked her to draw a four-sided triangle. ‘It’s where they belong.’

  ‘Not us.’ Caroline pushed past the pale woman, heading for the north door. ‘Aubrey, time to follow our noses.’

  Aubrey looked back to see Sylvia with one elbow on the rail, leaning over, studying the scene below as if she were on a riverbank on a lazy summer’s afternoon.