Lionboy: the Chase

by Zizou Corder

  A thought suddenly flew into Charlie’s mind, clear as a bird.

  Cui bono? Who benefits?

  It was true that the asthma medicine companies weren’t benefiting.

  But did they know that?

  Could they have known at the beginning what would happen?

  They might have thought it would benefit them a lot. They might have thought that with cars banned there weren’t enough sick children to need their drugs, and that making the children sick with specially ahergenic cats would be really good for business. They couldn’t have known that the parents would start getting rid of the cats instead of paying out for more medicine. They couldn’t have known that it wouldn’t benefit them. They might have thought it would.

  The medicine companies could have something to do with the sudden appearance of the Allergenies. In which case …

  Edward interrupted his thoughts.

  ‘Well, goodnight, Charlie,’ he said. ‘There’s a good boy. We’ll be going out soon, in the next few days, to the Doge.’

  The next few days! He’d have to make sure to speak to Enzo tomorrow.

  Charlie smiled nicely. ‘OK, then,’ he said politely. ‘Goodnight.’

  He lay in bed for an hour, trembling with frustration, before he deemed it quiet enough for him to sneak down to the Lions.

  When Aneba led Magdalen down to the high wall, Sergei was waiting for them. He was sitting like an Egyptian god with his ears – well, the complete one – tipped high. At his feet was an envelope.

  Sergei had it all worked out. He had thought and thought about how to communicate with these precious humans. He’d shocked the dad into consciousness; given him an adrenaline rush that had cleared his head long enough for him to realize he had to keep it clear. (Interesting that he’d immediately gone sniffing around the plants. Sergei did a similar thing when he felt sick – ate grass.) And he’d ripped out a newspaper story for them, that was no problem. They’d have some background information on what Charlie had been up to. But how to get them to go to Venice? He could go to the library in the town and rip out a page with Venice on it. But the town was too far away and he was in too much of a hurry. And anyway, cats – specially scrawny bald-bottomed cats with half an ear missing – were not exactly welcome in libraries. Especially not when they started tearing pages out of books. Not that that kind of thing worried him. He could achieve almost any sneaky thing he chose, but – he didn’t have the time. No, the newspaper story would have to do. Then he could lead them through the service tunnels and down to the station and get them on the train to Venice.

  Sergei flicked the envelope to Aneba with his paw.

  Aneba picked up the envelope and opened it.

  Under an artificial bush, he and Magdalen read the newspaper story. (It wasn’t the one that Charlie had seen, but another one, from a French paper. It gave pretty much the same information, though it didn’t mention Mabel.)

  They sighed. They smiled. They looked at each other. They remembered what their son was like.

  ‘He’s liberating Lions!’ cried Aneba. ‘Single-handed! Attaboy!’

  ‘Shh,’ shushed Magdalen.

  Sergei gave a sharp mraow, and beckoned them.

  The three of them slunk down alongside the high concrete wall, with Sergei leading. After a while, a rather nasty smell replaced the cool, sweet air to which they had become accustomed. Actually, a very nasty smell. A smell of old food and steamed chips and fish skin and – eeww. Magdalen and Aneba wrinkled their noses. It grew stronger.

  Soon it was explained. They came to an area, a sort of yard, with ranks of enormous dustbins lined up. The bins were moving, like slow soldiers in formation. Row by row, they slid forward towards – Magdalen and Aneba couldn’t quite make it out – a sort of rack, where long mechanical arms came out, and grabbed the bins, and tipped their contents on to a conveyor belt with sides to stop the rubbish falling off. The conveyor belt led into a tunnel.

  ‘Oh no,’ said Magdalen.

  Sergei went right up close to the conveyor belt, just as it entered the tunnel in the huge wall. Paper and plastic and rotten food and dustballs and coffee grounds and old wet rags and dead hair from hairbrushes and plastic bags and meat bones and the sludge from cleaning out the fishbowl and brown apple cores and used tissues and broken glass …

  ‘Oh well,’ said Aneba.

  It was quite clear what they were going to have to do.

  ‘But it’s nice here,’ said Magdalen. ‘I don’t see why we … we’ve been doing really well and it’s all so pleasant …’

  ‘Magdalen!’ cried Aneba.

  She looked at him blankly.

  ‘I don’t want to go in with all that filthy rubbish,’ she said. ‘I don’t see why I should.’

  ‘We make all that filthy rubbish,’ said Aneba drily. ‘You needn’t be so proud.’

  ‘I’m tired,’ said Magdalen. ‘I want to go back to my room. I’m not well.’

  She began to cry. Rather loudly.

  Aneba wondered if he should slap her. That’s one thing to do with hysterical people.

  He kissed her instead.

  ‘Oh,’ she said, blinking her eyes. ‘Sorry. Sorry – I’ll try …’

  ‘It’ll be OK as soon as we’re out of their air,’ said Aneba.

  They looked at Sergei. Sergei looked at them. They all looked at the rubbish. It was only slightly less unattractive to Sergei than it was to the humans.

  They all looked at each other. Two of them held their noses. They jumped on.

  Squidge.

  Yuck.

  Ugh.

  Chapter Seven

  When Charlie came down to the Lions that night they were restless, prowling about in the cool night air. They hadn’t finished their meat, and they were growing impatient. The Silver and Yellow Lionesses were lying in the moonlight looking for all the world like stone statues of St Mark’s Lion. The scent of jasmine still hung on the air.

  ‘So?’ said the Young Lion, bounding to Charlie’s side. ‘What’s going on? Any news about your parents?’

  ‘The news is,’ said Charlie, ‘that I’ve made contact with a cat outside, Enzo, and he’s a good bloke. The other news is – er – we’re going to go and live with the Doge in a day or two, so that he will be our friend, and we will be safer.’

  ‘What?’ said the Young Lion, to whom this made no sense at all.

  ‘I know,’ said Charlie. ‘It made no sense to me either, but there’re these people setting up camp outside who think I’m an angel and then a newspaper guy turned up, and Major Tib’s offered a reward for you, so we kind of ought to move. And at least we’ll be out of this building …’

  ‘What?’ said the Oldest Lion, even more confused.

  Charlie didn’t mean to confuse them at all, and was sorry to do so. He explained the various developments.

  The Lions were perplexed.

  ‘But we only want to leave!’ said the Young Lion. ‘Why has it all got so complicated? King Boris was going to help us. All we need is a boat and we can be off …’

  Charlie sighed.

  ‘I think Edward has other plans,’ he said. ‘You know when I had to measure you …?’

  The Oldest Lion was just about to say, Yes, he remembered, when a loud and unexpected creak split the silence of the night.

  Charlie quickly exchanged looks with the Lions.

  A door was opening on the far side of the cortile.

  Charlie made a dash through the shadowy arcade for the door he had come in by. He made it. Behind him, he could hear nothing but the silence that has a person in it, where previously there had been no person.

  From his familiar vantage point behind the door, Charlie peered out into the night. The moonlit cortile looked like a stage set. The fountain splashed. Somewhere a lone bird let out a long low note. It was very still.

  The person was Edward. With him was the crumply man. Behind them were the two men from the motoscafo. In their arms were piles of creamy feather
s, spattered with golden eyes.

  Charlie slowed his breathing right down.

  The men set down the feathers, and Edward eyed the Lions. Then he turned and said suddenly, loudly, shattering the silence – ‘Come on out, Charlie, we need you.’

  If Charlie ever swore, he would have sworn now. As it was, he emerged from the doorway and went over. There was not much else he could do.

  ‘Naughty boy,’ said Edward, but he didn’t seem too interested in that really. He had other things on his mind.

  ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Take these, and put them on the wounded one.’ And he gestured to the men to pass Charlie the great pile of feathers.

  Charlie knew just what was wanted of him.

  ‘OK,’ he said, and, taking hold of the bundle of feathers, he stood them upright to see, finally, if they really were what he thought they were. And he was right!

  The piles of feathers revealed themselves to be wings. Long, beautiful wings, plump and sleek and rich like archangels’ wings, or swans’ wings. Like the wings Claudio had described from the Bible. Like the wings on the stone lion outside St Mark’s.

  As Edward prepared to unlock the gate, Charlie held the wings up and showed them to Primo. Primo blinked lazily from within his turban, and flicked his ears to, and fro, and to again.

  Charlie was murmuring under his breath as he lugged the wings into the cage. The men stood well back, scared of the Lions.

  ‘Charlie, what’s going on?’ exclaimed the Young Lion. ‘What’s with the wings?’

  ‘Primo?’ Charlie murmured. The men mustn’t notice that he was whispering. ‘You understand, don’t you?’

  Primo gazed calmly.

  ‘It’s like that lion on the column,’ said the Young Lion.

  ‘Yes,’ said Charlie, giving his friend a smile. ‘They want Primo to be the ancient lion, the one we saw. The one that’s the patron of Venice. I think Edward is trying to fake a miracle – to please the Doge. What do you think, Primo? Can you do it? It’s the only way we’re going to get out of this fortress … What do you think?’

  Primo smiled beneath his cloth.

  ‘And what about my, er, wound?’ he said quietly. ‘Will my wound please the Doge?’

  Charlie smiled too. He knew Primo was talking about his teeth.

  ‘I think your wound will fill the Doge with fear and wonder,’ he said. ‘May I put these on you?’

  Primo bent his head a little. His sad eyes said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘My, oh my,’ murmured the Young Lion.

  The Oldest Lion smiled grimly.

  The crumply man tried to offer advice from beyond the bars, but Charlie ignored him and worked out for himself how the wings should be attached. They were beautifully made. Long, strong, unblemished white feathers had been sewn firmly on to narrow leather strips, and the strips nailed on to a wooden and metal frame that fanned out and folded down, and was attached to another frame the shape of Primo’s back. This one had been padded inside with soft thick velvet (the colour of Primo’s fur), so as not to rub and hurt him. It sat high on his back like a saddle, and was fastened beneath with leather straps as a saddle would be. The men gasped when Primo lay down to make the job easier, and again when he stood up for Charlie to reach under and fasten the straps. Once the big frame was positioned on Primo’s back, the wings lay smooth and curved along it.

  ‘Wow,’ said the Young Lion.

  The Lionesses breathed softly. They were all used to being magnificent, but even they were impressed.

  Charlie stood back. Silvered by moonlight in the old, old courtyard, Primo looked fabulous, like a mythical beast, a great ancient statue. His cloth-wrapped head gave an air of deep and peculiar mystery – evil, archaic mystery. He looked like an Egyptian death-god with the body of a lion, the wings of a swan and the head of a mummy. The men behind Charlie gasped – even Edward.

  ‘Magnifico,’ murmured the crumply man.

  The young man crossed himself.

  The crumply man was trying to tell Charlie something. He gestured to a short leather strap that hung at Primo’s breastbone, and to a small wire antenna that hung from it. Glancing at Edward first, he handed Charlie a tiny remote control.

  Charlie peered at it in the dim light.

  ‘What does it do?’ he asked.

  The man smiled and said something in Italian. Charlie didn’t understand it all, but got the drift.

  Murmuring to Primo, Charlie pointed the remote and pressed the left-hand button.

  Silently, gently, the Smilodon’s wings spread and rose in the moonlight, until they stood full and proud and rampant for all the world, as if Primo were about to take off in flight. He raised his paw, and growled softly. When he rippled the muscles of his great shoulders, the wings rippled too, like water under a breeze, or a swan shaking out his feathers. It was completely convincing.

  ‘Fantastico,’ murmured the crumply man.

  ‘Ostrega!’ said the young man.

  The curly man was dumbstruck.

  Edward smiled softly.

  ‘Way to go, Primo,’ the Young Lion murmured.

  The right-hand button lowered the wings. The middle button caused them to flap gently. Primo looked exactly like a giant, living, winged lion.

  ‘Take off the bandages,’ ordered Edward. ‘I need to see the full effect.’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Charlie. ‘His jaw is not strong enough yet.’

  Edward gave Charlie a considering look.

  ‘Really,’ said Charlie. ‘I’m good with ailments. Trust me.’ He gave Edward a big smile.

  Edward thought, and then nodded. ‘OK,’ he said.

  Charlie knew Edward was thinking about his mother, the scientist. Did he know about her talents as a healer? How much, in fact, did Edward know about what?

  At that moment a cold fear trickled into his heart and everything fell into place.

  It started with a simple thought: Edward knows that my mum and dad have maybe got a cure for asthma – not just a cure for an attack, but a cure to make it go away, all over the world, forever. This was followed by: Edward is not honest. Edward is double-crossing King Boris. Edward is chumming up with the Doge by taking him this great offering of the Winged Lion …

  And then the thoughts raced in, joining together and adding up.

  What if, thought Charlie, the asthma drug companies did somehow make the Allergenies? What if they were the ones who took my mum and dad? What if they want to use them to make new things, if they want to use their skills and talents to make new illnesses that they will then be able to make new drugs for?

  What if Edward is chumming up with them too? What plans might he have for me? He’s been keeping me prisoner as much as the Lions … maybe he’s planning to hand me over to someone for my own protection – i.e. for his own advantage. Everybody thinks I’m missing or drowned. The people who took Mum and Dad might try to use me to make Mum and Dad do things they don’t want to do …’

  All these thoughts tore through his mind and joined up to spell out one simple word: danger.

  I’ve go to move fast, thought Charlie. The web is closing around us. I’ve got to get these Lions to safety and I’ve got to find my parents.

  He was still smiling nicely at Edward. He felt sick.

  ‘Give me the remote control,’ said Edward.

  Charlie looked at him, and looked at Primo.

  Primo kind of winked.

  Charlie handed Edward the little instrument. And the moment he did so, Primo turned to Edward, flared his yellow eyes, and began a low but unmistakable growl.

  Edward flinched.

  Primo growled a little louder.

  Edward handed the remote control back to Charlie.

  Primo smiled beneath his bindings.

  Edward was relieved, but annoyed – embarrassed.

  The Young Lion and Elsina stifled their smiles.

  ‘The bandages must come off tomorrow,’ Edward said, trying to reclaim his authority. ‘How can we present to the Do
ge a bandaged-up Lion?’

  The tunnel, the conveyor belt, the rubbish – it was all filthy and disgusting and smelt worse than anything either of the two humans had ever smelt before. Sergei, of course, was more used to it. Bliddy human softies, he thought, nibbling on a bit of fishbone.

  It went on a long time too.

  Magdalen threw up. It didn’t really make anything more revolting because it was all so revolting anyway. Aneba said it was good because it would get some of the drugs out of her body. Magdalen said thanks very much and fell asleep. She had eggshells in her hair.

  After a while, they were spewed out into the late dusk and the pale light of an early moon.

  The conveyor belt was up in the air. Way beneath them was a vehicle park and recharging point lit by a low lamp. Ahead of them was the hugest pile of rubbish Aneba had ever seen. It was like a swamp of rubbish, or a moor, stretching for miles, with slopes and valleys of rough, scrappy, sludgy garbage: plastic bags flapping on top, unspeakable filth lurking below. Animals – they couldn’t see what – scavenged about on the surface, lifting their feet delicately, sniffing and snuffling.

  It went on as far as the horizon. The conveyor belt continued above it like a boring, stinky fairground ride. Boring, that is, until about 500 metres in, when the belt began to flex and flip like a great snake, chucking its rubbishy load off on to the vast dark pile. The smell was a hundred times worse, as the filth and detritus flew through the air, trash juice spattering about and lumps and scraps flying through the air.

  It was clear where they had to jump: on the softness of the rubbish (Oh, yuck, thought Aneba) but right at the edge, before they got carried over on to the interminable plain and were chucked into revolting oblivion by the belt’s bucking rodeo …

  They roused themselves – carefully. They didn’t want to fall on to the hard ground way below. The great filthy pile was approaching beneath them … the smell was outrageous … uughhh – NOW!

  They leapt: man, woman and cat.

  They rolled. It’s better not to think about that bit.

  They came to a halt at the edge. So far, so good.