Blood Royal
Page 28
“So it would seem,” Ulysses agreed.
He gazed at the midnight forest and the darkness of the world around him, as if expecting something to happen at any moment.
“So what happens now?” the child-monster asked.
“Now?” the dandy said, staring at the sky above, as the heavens turned the colour of snow. “Now we wait.”
“What, isn’t there a moral?”
Ulysses fixed the head with a stare as hard as stone. “Perhaps it hasn’t one.”
The Alice face frowned disapprovingly. “Tut, tut, child! Everything’s got a moral, if you can only find it.”
“Alright then, how about this? Don’t get a life – live a life?”
“Oh no, that won’t do. I don’t like that at all.”
“Very well then. How about, make hay while the sun shines? Or, there’s nothing virtual about reality? Or ego cogito, ergo sum?”
“Hmm, perhaps,” the child-head pondered. “But perhaps if you told me the story again I might be able to determine the moral that way.”
“Tell it again? This was no story.” Ulysses gave an exasperated sigh. “Besides, I wouldn’t know where to begin!”
“Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop.”
“Look, are going to keep this up all the time?”
“The time has come,” the anomaly said by way of a reply, “to talk of many things: of shoes – and ships – and sealing wax – of cabbages – and kings – and why the sea is boiling hot – and whether pigs have wings.’
Ulysses turned his back on the chattering child and slowly walked away.
“I’ll be seeing you again,” the child’s voice called out after him, crackling like an old gramophone recording, “of that you can be certain, Mr Quicksilver. My champion.”
THERE WAS A hazy quality to the air of the chamber and an all-pervading smell of pomanders and lubricating oil. In the crimson gloom, Her Majesty Queen Victoria – Empress of India, Monarch of Mars and Ruler de facto of the Lunar colonies – slept the sleep of the dead, bound within the confines of her steam-powered, life-supporting throne.
There was more machine than monarch now. The physical husk the old woman had become could never leave the Empress Engine that Erasmus Quicksilver had created for her all those years ago; ninety-seven, to be precise. The Widow of Windsor herself was just a withered, fleshless creature that had been kept alive long beyond her natural span, and for far longer than was good for her deteriorating mind.
But in her death-like slumber her eyelids flickered.
The peace of the chamber was interrupted by a delicate chiming coming from the throne itself.
In moments, a lady-in-waiting was at the sleeping monarch’s side, deciphering the ticker-tape readout produced by the agitated engine.
Her eyes wide with incredulity, she hurried to the telephony device on hand, close by, and picked up the receiver.
There was a static click as someone picked up at the other end of the line.
“Doctor Malbuse?”
“What is it?” the Queen’s personal surgeon-cum-engineer responded sharply.
“It’s the Empress Engine, doctor, I... I’ve never seen readings like this.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s... It’s as if...” She trailed off, unable to find the words.
“What is it, woman? Tell me!”
“Doctor, I think you need to see this for yourself.”
And in her sleep, the Queen smiled.
THE LONG GRASS rustled at her feet as the White Rabbit hurried by and she could hear the rattle of the teacups as the March Hare and his friends shared their never-ending meal, and the shrill voice of the Queen ordering her unfortunate guests off to execution, mixed up with the distant sob of the miserable Mock Turtle.
So she sat, with eyes closed, and half believed herself in Wonderland, though she knew she had but to open them again, and all would change to dull reality.
And she considered how she would gather about her little children, and how she would make their eyes bright and eager with many a strange tale, perhaps even with the dream of Wonderland of long ago; and how she would feel with all their simple sorrows, and find pleasure in all their simple joys, remembering her own child-life, and the happy summer days.
Still she haunts me, phantomwise,
Alice moving under skies
Never seen by waking eyes.
Children yet, the tale to hear,
Eager eye and willing ear,
Lovingly shall nestle near.
In a Wonderland they lie,
Dreaming as the days go by,
Dreaming as the summers die:
Ever drifting down the stream –
Lingering in the golden gleam –
Life, what is it but a dream?
from Through the Looking-Glass,
and What Alice Found There, by Lewis Carroll
The End
About the Author
JONATHAN GREEN is a writer of speculative fiction, with more than forty books to his name. He is the creator of Abaddon Books’ Pax Britannia steampunk universe.
He has written for such diverse properties as Doctor Who, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Sonic the Hedgehog, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Moshi Monsters, but – outside of the steampunk milieu – he is probably best known for his contributions to the Fighting Fantasy range of adventure gamebooks and numerous Black Library publications, which draw inspiration from the table top war-gaming systems of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000.
He currently divides his time between West London and rural Wiltshire. To find out more about his latest projects visit www.JonathanGreenAuthor.com.
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