The Chosen Ones

by Scarlett Thomas

  ‘Albion Freake? The American businessman?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Go on.’

  As quickly as she could, Effie explained to Pelham Longfellow everything she knew about the limited-edition single volume.

  ‘I think he’s a Book Eater,’ said Effie. ‘He’s going to make himself the Last Reader of The Chosen Ones and then destroy it and—’

  ‘But a book that popular would give them enough power to launch a serious attack on Dragon’s Green,’ said Pelham.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ said Effie. ‘I have to help stop them . . . I have to . . .’

  ‘You have to rest.’

  ‘But I didn’t promise that I wouldn’t investigate Skylurian Midzhar. Only you did. And no one said anything about Albion Freake. I could . . .’ Effie suddenly felt a little faint again, and weak. She closed her hands into fists to try to will back some power. She was used to feeling strong. This was not like her at all. But she couldn’t give up. She would never give up.

  ‘You have to take these capsules, one a day for three days, it says here, and REST.’

  ‘But I think what Skylurian has planned is going to coincide with the Sterran Guandré. I don’t know why, or how. But . . .’

  ‘Yes, that would make sense.’ Pelham sighed and looked more anxious than Effie had ever seen him before.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s too complicated to explain. And we’re here.’

  The taxi pulled up outside St Pancras Station. All trains to the north and south of the country now went from St Pancras. Trains to the east and west went from Paddington. All the other old railway stations had been left as beautiful ruins, destined to become luxury cocktail bars or bird sanctuaries. Euston was now a massive butterfly house. But St Pancras had finally been restored to its Victorian glory, with its beautiful ridge-and-furrow roof, and its vast booking office.

  Pelham paid the driver and helped Effie out onto the pavement.

  ‘Can you walk?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, I think so,’ said Effie. ‘I don’t think my physical energy has been affected that much.’

  St Pancras Station smelled of coffee, and was full of the dry squawking sounds of the bright green parakeets that filled London. The parakeets spent their days swooping in and out of large buildings in small flocks, calling to one another, adding to the complex and significant part of the Cosmic Web that covered the whole of the city.

  Next to the vendor selling the Evening Standard (which was now back in print) was a gentleman in a dark hat selling printed copies of The Liminal. He was chatting to one of the many witch journalists who roamed large buildings and nature reserves getting leads from the Cosmic Web to pass on to The Liminal’s editor. This young witch was wearing a black lace skirt over several petticoats, with a black jumper and a velvet cape. The velvet cape made Effie think about Leander for a moment. She wanted to see him again, to talk to him about being an interpreter. But the feeling soon left her. Like so much else, it seemed too difficult, and remote, and strange.

  Effie followed Pelham into the huge booking office, wishing she could feel more excited about what she was seeing, hearing and smelling. Instead, she felt jumpy, as if what was going on around her was so big, loud and overwhelming that it had stopped being real at all. Effie had never been to the cinema – it was too expensive these days for most people – but she wondered if this was what it was like.

  ‘One child, please,’ said Pelham, after naming the city where Effie lived. ‘Super First Class.’

  The clerk printed out the yellow paper ticket with the letters SFC in gold foil and handed it to Pelham. Effie expected him to then ask for an adult ticket, but he did not.

  ‘Right, come on,’ he said. ‘Platform One, I believe.’

  Effie hurried to keep up with his long-legged stride. They were at Platform One before she had the chance to say anything.

  ‘Professor Quinn will meet you when you arrive,’ said Pelham. ‘I don’t think you’ve been introduced yet? In the meantime, you’ve got your own compartment with a bed. There’s a chef on board. I suggest you eat something wholesome and then sleep. Take one of the capsules first. Take the second one at bedtime tonight, and the last one when you wake up in the morning. No harm in doing it quickly.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘And I’ll come and see you in a day or so.’

  ‘But what about Skylurian Midzhar?’

  ‘We can’t do anything about her now. But Albion Freake might be a different matter. I’m going to look into him, work out what he has planned. It adds a new dimension to this whole thing. You’ve done a lot for the Otherworld in the last few days, Effie. You’ve played your part in helping to protect Dragon’s Green. We thank you. But you must rest and get your strength back up now.’

  The guard blew his whistle. ‘All aboard!’ he shouted.

  Pelham was one of those adults whom you would never describe as ‘cuddly’. He was too bony and angular, for one thing. For another, he was always in a rush to go somewhere or send a message to someone. But now he did pull Effie into an awkward, somewhat elbowy embrace. Effie breathed in his comforting Otherworld smell as if for the last time.

  ‘Please don’t leave me,’ she said.

  ‘You’ll be fine, child,’ he said. ‘Although I think you might need this.’ He opened his bag and took out of it Effie’s precious box. ‘Some reading for the train, I think. And also of course, my card, which I can sense in there somewhere. Don’t forget, you can call me at any time.’

  ‘Can I call you now?’ said Effie.

  Pelham smiled. ‘You are a strong force, Euphemia. You don’t need babysitting. I think you’ll like your compartment. I got you the very best one, although nowadays they’re all so nice. The guard will get you anything you need. Have a comfortable trip.’

  The guard blew his whistle again and gave Effie a rather meaningful look.

  ‘Thank you for saving me,’ said Effie to Pelham.

  The look he gave her back was full of love, but also seemed to say to her, You’re not saved yet, poor child. Then he was gone, and Effie was being hurried onto the train by the guard who seemed simultaneously to be tutting and shaking his head and punching a hole in Effie’s ticket, and then slamming the heavy metal door behind her and showing her to her compartment.

  Pelham had been right. Effie’s compartment was like nothing she’d ever seen. It was a bit like the plane all over again, except that everything here was much bigger. On three sides its walls were panelled with dark polished wood. The fourth side was entirely taken up with windows out of which the occupant could watch the scenery rolling by in complete comfort and privacy.

  If only Effie could have enjoyed it more. She slipped off her boots and lay down on the large bed to read the menu for afternoon tea. She yawned. Pelham had told her to eat something to get her strength up. Remembering some of the advertisements she’d seen in the Esoteric Emporium, Effie ordered a plate of mixed pickles with some sourdough bread, and a box of six hand-made violet creams. But she was so tired that she had fallen asleep before it even arrived, and before she had remembered to take the golden capsule.

  23

  Wolf was being followed. He was sure of it. He had not seen the person who was following him since he’d left school, but he was aware of them. The odd click of a footstep; the sound of someone breathing. He had not turned around, of course. If you are being followed, you may as well let the person doing it think you don’t know. Then you still have the element of surprise on your side. You let your enemy believe they are more powerful than they are, which makes them complacent.

  Wolf knew all about strategy, because for the last month he had been reading every book he could find on the subject. Wolf had never thought of himself as a particularly bookish person before – despite somehow getting into the top set for English – but he found he just loved learning about this subject. Books on Napoleon were his favourite. But he would read anything about military str
ategy, strategy in sports, even strange old-fashioned guides on leadership and decision-making. It helped that Wolf had managed to acquire his own bookshop, of course. But, as he reminded himself yet again, it wasn’t really his. He would have to give it back. But to whom?

  Effie would know. But she hadn’t been at school today, again. Luckily they’d had a supply teacher for maths who’d forgotten even to bring the register. And Coach Bruce never remembered his and always just said everyone had been present, including the more ‘troubled’ children who always bunked off and no one wanted in their classes anyway. Wolf sighed. He had to tell Effie his secret as soon as possible. He knew he had to. He wouldn’t feel right until he did. And he’d decided that today would be the day. And then . . . she’d disappeared again. Where was she? The most important thing was that she was safe of course. But if he didn’t tell her soon, it would be as if he had been deliberately keeping it all to himself.

  But wasn’t that what he had done? After all, he’d had almost a month to tell her, and he hadn’t. But then she had never asked. No one had. No one had asked what had happened to Leonard Levar’s Antiquarian Bookshop, to which Wolf now possessed the only set of keys. Looking after the shop meant he’d had a chance to read all those books, and learn things that would help him and his friends fight the Diberi. He’d even found out quite a bit more about who the Diberi were and what they wanted. Wolf had never opened the shop. He’d never taken any money. Well, except just a tiny bit from the till for food and essentials. And he’d given the shop a good clean in return.

  And he’d used the old desktop computer in the office – with its dusty old dial-up modem – to get the address of the Missing Persons Office in London. He’d written to them about Natasha. His sister. So far there had been no response, but he wasn’t going to give up.

  The footsteps click-clicked behind him. Who on earth could it be? No one from his school ever came this way. There wasn’t much in the way of housing on this side of the Old Town. There was the university, with its big old library, and the hospital. And then . . .

  The Old Rectory. Where Effie’s grandfather Griffin had lived.

  This was Wolf’s other secret. Something else he really needed Effie to know about before anyone else did. Surely she would understand that he needed somewhere safe to bring Natasha when he did find her. She’d be about nine by now. If she was even still alive.

  Anyway, he couldn’t be seen here by anyone. So instead of entering through the small gate, as he’d done every day after school for the last few weeks, he walked on. Oddly, the footsteps seemed to stop. Wolf heard the sound of the small gate’s latch being lifted, and the familiar squeak as it opened onto the front garden. If the person following him had gone through the gate, then their back would now be to him. It was safe for him to look. He turned and there was . . . Lexy!

  What was she doing here? Had she found him out? Wolf considered hiding for a bit longer, but then reminded himself that Lexy was one of his closest friends. But in that case, why had she been following him? Wolf watched as Lexy looked under the flowerpot for a spare key and, finding none, started trying to look for a way into the Old Rectory. What was she up to?

  Wolf watched as Lexy crept around the side of the large red-brick house and then disappeared. There was an open window just before the back door. It was too small for anyone but a child to get in. But Lexy was a child. Had she gone in through the window? The flat below Griffin Truelove’s had not been occupied for quite a while, and Wolf had rather stupidly never even thought about securing it. But he now realised that if anyone got into the ground-floor flat they could easily enter the shared hallway and go up the stairs and . . .

  But why would Lexy want to do any of that?

  Wolf went round the front of the house and let himself in with his key. It wasn’t strictly his key, of course. Wolf had wondered whether someone would come and throw him out of what had been Griffin’s old flat, but they had not. And then he had found a lot of legal papers in Leonard Levar’s shop that showed that Levar had bought this flat from Griffin Truelove, using a complicated alias. Leonard Levar had existed purely in the world of nefarious magical people and all his property, now that he had finally been killed, seemed to belong to no one.

  And Wolf had needed somewhere to live after walking out on the uncle who used to beat him for fun, and who made him work after school for no pay. The uncle who sent Wolf out every night to buy his large cod and chips, but who’d fed his nephew on the scraps of soggy batter and burnt chips he left. Wolf had been treated worse than a neglected pet. So here he was. He’d told himself it was just temporary. Just until he found Natasha and sorted himself out a bit.

  So far, he was doing fine.

  And now here was Lexy. Why?

  Soon the front door of the downstairs flat clicked softly and began to open. Wolf crossed his arms and waited. Lexy crept out, her hands full of postcards that she dropped immediately on seeing Wolf. She gasped, and pressed her hand to her chest and looked as if she was about to pass out from fear.

  ‘Oh my God, Wolf!’ she said. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I could ask you the same thing,’ said Wolf. ‘Why were you following me?’

  ‘Following you? But you’re following me!’

  ‘What? Don’t be stupid. You must have seen me walking in front of you as we came out of school.’

  ‘Not without my glasses,’ said Lexy. ‘Stuff in the distance is just a blur to me. My eyesight only works well close-up. Which is handy, given what I do.’

  ‘I’ve never seen you in glasses.’

  ‘Yep. And you never will,’ said Lexy, firmly.

  ‘But—’

  ‘Anyway, what are you doing here?’ said Lexy.

  ‘I live here. I know, I know. It’s a long story. I’ve basically been here since we killed Leonard Levar. What are you doing here?’

  ‘Looking for information on Miss Dora Wright, of course. Like we agreed? You were going to be working out strategies, and Maximilian was going to be finding out about Albion Freake and . . .’

  ‘Oh yes. Of course. I’d completely forgotten that this is where Miss Wright used to live. It makes sense now. What have you got there?’

  Lexy was picking up the pieces of card from the floor where she’d dropped them. Wolf leant down to help her.

  ‘Postcards, sent about a month ago, all postmarked London,’ said Lexy. ‘Look. They’re either blank, or written in a language I’ve never seen before. There’s something else that’s odd about them. For one thing, they are clearly from Miss Wright. Who sends postcards to themselves? I’m going to take them to Effie and see what she makes of them. If she’s come back from wherever she went, that is.’

  ‘Yeah. I need to have a chat with Effie as well,’ said Wolf. ‘I’ll come with you.’

  Just then a crackle came from Lexy’s school bag. It was the sound of someone beginning to make contact through a walkie-talkie. It had to be Effie. It was, but she didn’t sound quite herself.

  ‘At last,’ said Wolf. ‘She’s all right. Let’s go.’

  Professor Quinn was still persuading Orwell Bookend – via an ancient blend of hypnosis and dark magic – that his daughter had not disappeared last night at all but had in fact been at home in bed with a fever the whole time. Orwell Bookend was naturally resistant to magic. Luckily, though, he was not at all resistant to the charms of Professor Quinn. It helped that she was on the promotions committee at the university this year. Orwell would do pretty much anything – including changing his entire belief system – if it meant a chance of promotion. So he had the kettle on for a second cup of tea and was considering opening the best packet of biscuits in the house.

  Effie had been surprised when she had been met off the train by this large, beautiful woman with shiny hair that seemed to take in every possible colour all at once. She was wearing bright red lipstick and a long, dark-green silk dress with high-heeled ankle boots. Her nails were painted a deep plum colour. Effie had lik
ed her immediately, but had been confused.

  ‘I thought . . .’ she had begun, in the taxi home.

  ‘What?’ said Professor Quinn.

  ‘I thought you were a man. I thought you taught at my school.’

  ‘My husband is a man who teaches at your school, if that’s any help. He’s also called Professor Quinn, although I’ve been a professor for longer. I was told to keep an eye on you a while ago, but I’ve just been finishing my latest book and . . . Well, anyway. I’m here now. We’ll pop you home, and . . .’

  There was a slightly awkward pause. Professor Quinn had stopped speaking, but carried on looking at Effie intently.

  ‘Oh,’ said Effie, suddenly, shaking her head. ‘You can do that?’

  ‘What? Oh. You know when someone’s in your mind. Useful. In that case I’m sorry to be rude. I should have asked first. Normally I’d ask you to tell me what happened, but I can see that you’re worn out, poor child.’

  ‘So you’re a mage?’

  ‘Yes. A mage explorer, which makes life rather interesting. Have you heard of the Department of Subterranean Geography at the university? I’m currently its Director of Research. We do very well in terms of large and complex grants.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘Your father will know me.’

  And so he had.

  While Professor Quinn continued to charm her father, Effie was lying in bed. Maximilian, who had recently come in the window, was pacing her room, waiting for their other friends to arrive. Maximilian hadn’t even really needed to come in the window. Effie’s father was still being nice to her and was therefore in the mood to welcome any friends who happened to drop by. This is, of course, what can happen when magic is allowed to enter the mind of a resistant.

  Orwell was also in a good mood because tomorrow he was to go to the Town Hall to hand over his copy of The Chosen Ones and receive his fifty pounds and the chance to win free electricity for life. Albion Freake was actually going to be there in person, drawing the winning entry. It had to be Orwell. He just felt lucky, suddenly.