The City of Guardian Stones

by Jacob Sager Weinstein

  “Not right now,” I said. “Why don’t you go back to your building and, um, stay alert for suspicious activity. Maybe, you know, try to be quiet. To help with the subterfuge.”

  “Good plan,” she whispered, winking. “Quiet. Subtle. Practically invisible!” She strode away on her massive legs, then paused and waved her arm in a huge, stiff gesture that could be seen from miles away. “FOND REGARDS TO YOUR BELOVED RELATIVES!”

  CHAPTER 47

  Victoria Park was a train ride away, and the closer we got, the thicker the fog became. This was a good thing, since Oaroboarus ran behind us the entire way, and his train costume was even less convincing than his bus costume. Not that I could criticize him – I was impressed that he and Little Ben had prepared for all eventualities. They had created an entire old-fashioned steam train from scraps, with a grille on the front made from a rusty drying rack and a working smokestack made from a kettle puffing out steam. Let’s just say it was the kind of costume that became more convincing the less you could see of it.

  Fortunately, by the time we stepped out of the station, the fog had got so thick that you couldn’t see more than a block away.

  Little Ben swapped Oaroboarus’s train costume for his bus one. “Do you think the fog is thicker everywhere, or just here?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “And look, it’s moving. How does it do that with no breeze?”

  As we walked down the ramp from the station to the road, billows of fog flowed alongside us. And as we walked along the road towards the park, they continued to tag along.

  “Maybe the fog is going to the park, too,” Mom said.

  “Mom, come on. That’s … actually, that might be right.” And it was. The fog flowed straight alongside us until we got to the park, at which point, the misty stream turned left along a tree-lined avenue, joining an already thick mass. We stepped into it, and everything vanished. I held up my hand and could see only the faintest outlines of my fingers through the dense, damp mist.

  “Wow!” Little Ben’s voice said from somewhere nearby. “An authentic London Particular! Back in Victorian times, they were so thick, people used to walk right into the Thames.”

  Now that we were inside it, I could see swirls of colour in the whiteness. A yellow patch twisted past me, and I thought I heard a faint voice murmuring, “Yes, boss, that’s a great idea.” A black spot whisked past, and I heard, “She’s been stealing your crayons, not me.”

  “I think all the lies in London are heading to this park,” I said. “Keep walking straight. Let’s see if we can get through this.”

  Holding my arms out in front of me, I manoeuvred around a tree. I emerged onto a large field that was fog-free but goalpost-heavy. I counted six soccer pitches in a row. “Who plays that much soccer?” I asked.

  “Here in England, we call it football,” Mom said.

  “I can call it either!” Little Ben said, bouncing up and down. “I have joint citizenship! I’m a descendant and/or scientific creation of Ben Franklin! Probably!”

  The trees ran all the way around the field, and an impenetrable avenue of fog ran all the way around the trees. It was as though everything on the other side of the trees had simply been erased.

  “Over here!” a familiar brusque voice called from somewhere in the foggy area.

  “Chapel, is that you?” I said. “Keep calling, and we’ll find you.”

  “Not much for talking without purpose. Wait. I know. Battle cry. Enn brauzt bryggjur Lundúna. Yggs veðrþorinn éla kennir,” he called loudly.

  If his aim was to get us moving towards him, he failed, because I stopped dead in my tracks.

  “Enn brauzt bryggjur Lundúna. Yggs veðrþorinn éla kennir,” Chapel shouted again, and I got moving, because his battle cry had raised a question that I needed answered. By the fourth or fifth time he was through it, we had stumbled close enough that we could make out his face.

  Hungerford trotted up, apparently guided through the fog by Chapel’s voice as well.

  “Where did you hear those words?” I asked Chapel.

  “Don’t know meaning. Old Brethren fight song. Never paid much attention to translations. About a battle on London Bridge. Viking? Anglo-Saxon? Not sure.”

  “Little Ben, did you understand it?”

  “No! That’s the first language I’ve found that I don’t speak,” Little Ben said. “Why do you ask?”

  “Because those are the words to a family lullaby. My mom and my aunts have been singing it to me since I was little. Only they sing it slower and … sillier, I guess.”

  I sang the words I had tapped out to Mom when we were locked in cells next to each other: “Ann browsed bridger luna doona, Eggs feather thorn, a la kenner.”

  Mom joined in – and through the fog, other voices echoed us. “This way,” I said, and we stumbled towards the voices.

  As the echoes faded, a stone archway emerged through the fog. We stepped inside it, and suddenly, we could see each other. The fog stayed outside, as though held back by an invisible wall.

  We were in a small stone alcove, about twice as tall as I was. “Is this an alcove from Old London Bridge?” Little Ben asked.

  “Look up,” Chapel answered, pointing upwards to a symbol etched in the very top of the arch. It was a triangle overlaid on an X overlaid on a circle, with a cross on top. “Bridge Mark. Symbol of the Brethren.”

  I thought back to the zombie bunny rabbit that Lady Roslyn wore around her neck, which had turned out to be an illustration of the first urn that carried water. “Is it a symbol or a rune? I mean, does it have magic powers?”

  “Not sure,” Chapel said, although his face had already said it. “Good question. Wish I’d asked. Only know it’s on everything the Brethren built.”

  I tried to make sense of it all. “My ancestors were caretakers of the secret rivers, and the Brethren were caretakers of the bridge that harnessed their powers. Maybe that’s why we know the same song.”

  “When you sang it from a distance, the alcove echoed it,” Little Ben said. “What happens if you try it from inside the alcove?”

  “Ann browsed bridger luna doona,” Mom and I sang. “Eggs feather thorn, a la kenner.”

  “BAAAA,” somebody said. I looked at Hungerford in astonishment.

  “Don’t, don’t direct your attention in my direction,” he said. “That’s not the, the, the sound typically associated with my species.”

  “BAAAAA.” It was definitely a sheep, somewhere nearby.

  Little Ben’s eyes opened in a sudden realization. “It’s the other alcoves,” he said. “People used to stand in one alcove on London Bridge and whisper, and people in other alcoves could hear them. They thought it was the shape of the stone that focused the echoes – but it must have been magic. And I think you’ve reactivated it.”

  “So there are sheep wandering into the other alcoves somewhere?” I said. “Why sheep?”

  “Why don’t we ask her?” Mom said.

  “What are you talking about, Mom?”

  “Well, if we can hear the sheep, they can hear us, right? So we’ll wait until Minnie shows up to pet the sheep, and then we can ask her where she is.”

  “That’s the most ridiculous —” I stopped and switched to a whisper. “You’re right. I mean, kind of. If we can hear the sheep, Minnie can hear us. If she shows up at the other alcoves, wherever they are, we can eavesdrop on her. But we’d better be quiet.”

  We didn’t have long to wait. After a few peaceful minutes, listening to the sheep bleating and the lies murmuring through the mist, we jumped when a raspy voice croaked out, “Drop me off here, Dad.”

  Was that Minnie? She sounded like an old woman with a bad cigarette habit. Whoever it was paused, as if listening to somebody else, then continued, “I’ll meet you at the London Stone once I’ve —”

  Her voice faded out. She must have stepped out of her alcove.

  I walked out of ours, gesturing to the others to follow me. Back out in the fog, w
e couldn’t see each other, but at least we could talk without fear of being overheard.

  Little Ben spoke first. “If they’re going after the London Stone, it’s even worse than we thought. That’s the most ancient and powerful stone in the city. It’s —”

  I held up a hand to interrupt him, then realized he wouldn’t be able to see it. Heck, I couldn’t see it. So I interrupted the slightly less polite way. “Stop! Listen.”

  Over the sheep and the lies, we heard the sound of an engine.

  “I bet that’s the Precious Man’s van,” I said. “They’ll be here any minute.”

  CHAPTER 48

  “Let’s hide and see what she does,” Little Ben said.

  “Hide? Nonsense. Time for battle,” Chapel said. With his expressive face hidden by the fog, his tone of voice seemed even brusquer.

  “Chapel’s right,” I said. “It’s not like we can get those stolen stones back any more. Plus, I think I know why she’s here. Follow me.”

  Then after a pause, I added, “Specifically, follow me to the soccer fields, which is where you’d see me heading, if you could see me.”

  I felt my way to the inside of the foggy wall, away from the road. When the others had emerged, I gestured to the field around us.

  “Why isn’t the fog collecting here? What makes this area unique? It’s all those goalposts. And goalposts are big pieces of metal with nets hung over them. I know from personal experience that the right kind of metal, arranged in the right way, can control magic. It’s true of taps and I bet it’s true of goalposts, too. I bet you anything those goalposts and the stone alcoves were part of whatever defence system the city had set up with the stones, to prevent explosions. And now that the stones are gone, the fog is pouring into the park and hovering around the edges of this magical circuit.”

  “So what do we do?” Little Ben asked.

  “Chapel, you head to the London Stone and capture the Precious Man.”

  Delight spread across his face, mixed with a hunger for action, but all he said was “Right.” He ran off into the fog.

  “As for us,” I said, “we’re going to —”

  That’s when Minnie Tickle flew out of the fog. She had beams shooting out of both hands, each one levitating an alcove. She did not look happy to see us.

  So I just yelled “DESTROY THE GOALS!” and ran towards the nearest one.

  Now, I had read plenty of articles about fans tearing down goalposts after a game, and I had always imagined it was the kind of thing that happened in one excited instant. It turned out that pulling over a massive piece of metal embedded in concrete wasn’t an easy task. I jumped and I pulled. Nothing happened. Seconds later, Little Ben got there and started jumping and pulling. Nothing happened. Oaroboarus head-butted it repeatedly. That was a lot noisier, but not much more effective.

  Meanwhile, Minnie had spread her arms, making the hovering alcoves fly towards opposite ends of the field. Her tattoos began to swirl. Beams shot out of her fingers, and as she slowly closed her arms, the beams closed in, too, sweeping the London Particular up between them, as though each beam were an alcove-tipped tong. The fog didn’t breach the invisible wall that seemed to stretch between the goalposts, but that wall must not have gone very high. The fog began to collect over our heads.

  “Stand aside!” Hungerford roared as he ran headfirst into the goal. It probably would have been better if he had roared it before he ran into the goal, since that might have given us humans time to get out of the way. Still, even though the falling goal smashed me and Little Ben to the ground, I couldn’t complain too much. Hungerford had got the job done.

  And now that the goal was down, the fog above us began to wobble inside the beams of light, like soup sloshing in a bowl. But it didn’t spill out.

  Minnie now faced a dilemma. To aim a lightning bolt at us, she’d have to point her hands, but that would mean losing even more control of the fog.

  She let the alcoves fall, pointed both hands at Hungerford, and fired.

  As Hungerford staggered back, the fog began billowing away. Minnie quickly turned her attention back to it. Fresh beams shot out, catching the alcoves moments before they hit the ground.

  “Are you OK?” I asked.

  “I’m, I’m, I’m winded but entirely undaunted,” he said, but there was a scorch mark on his side where she had hit him, and some of his stone flesh had been chipped away.

  “Hungerford’s the only one of us who can knock these goals down,” I said, “but I don’t know how many more hits he can take. So the rest of us are going to —”

  Before I could finish, Oaroboarus ran towards the nearest goal and began head-butting it futilely. I knew he wasn’t going to knock it over, but I also knew better than to waste time trying to stop him. So I turned to the others. “The rest of us except Oaroboarus are going to do everything we can to draw Minnie’s fire while he knocks down more goals.”

  “NONSENSE!” roared Hungerford. “I refuse to, to, to permit my allies to absorb the blows intended for —”

  “It’s the strategically sound choice,” I said. “CHARGE!”

  Little Ben and I ran straight for Minnie.

  Mom did not. She had somehow got fascinated by a particular curved piece of broken goalpost, and she crouched down on the grass, fiddling with it. I was annoyed, but if it meant she wasn’t going to get in my way, it was probably a good decision.

  Hungerford charged after us, which was not a good decision. Apparently strategic soundness was not the way to convince him. I tried another approach. “Down with the goalposts! For the honor of Mrs Coade!”

  “For Mrs Coade!” he roared, and split off.

  As Little Ben and I came at her, Minnie fired lightning bolts, dropping one hand to shoot, then once again pointing it up to catch the falling alcove, and then dropping the other hand to shoot again. She looked like she was conducting a symphony and juggling at the same time. It was an impressive performance, but I was too busy trying not to die to appreciate it. Fortunately, with the three of us weaving towards her, her aim wasn’t as keen as it might have been. She singed my heels and my elbow, and I got at least two fireball haircuts, but we managed to get down to her end of the field without major injury.

  Once we were there, we had a bit of a problem:

  When you’re fighting an opponent who can fly, all she has to do is go up a couple of feet in the air, and she’s out of your reach.

  And when she can throw fireballs, it doesn’t matter how high she goes: you’re still in her range.

  “Run away!” I said, and we turned around and started weaving back.

  Hey, I hadn’t actually expected to stop her. All I wanted to do was give her enough to worry about that she wouldn’t focus on Hungerford while he knocked down more goals. And I could see that he had toppled three more. That left eight, including the one that Oaroboarus was still head-butting to no effect whatsoever.

  Singed but still alive, I made it back to where Mom was standing. She had finally finished fiddling with the bent goalpost fragment, and she held it up right in front of my face. “Look, dear! I put some torn-up net on it so it looks like a flower!”

  “Mom, that’s not import —”

  I was interrupted by a fireball shot straight at my face.

  CHAPTER 49

  The fireball went right into Mom’s homemade flower. The net caught it, and it stayed there, fizzing, close enough that I could feel how badly it would have burned me if Mom hadn’t stopped it.

  I had to admit: the ball of flame, spinning in the torn lace of the net, reflecting off the metal of the broken bit of goalpost – it was beautiful, even if it looked less like a flower and more like an incandescent soccer ball.

  Soccer ball. Huh.

  “Drop that for me, would you, Mom?”

  She let go. As it fell towards the ground, I had a moment of doubt. The fact that the fireball was staying inside Mom’s makeshift container suggested that the particular combination of metal and lace ha
d some kind of holding powers. So if I kicked it, it probably wouldn’t burn my foot to a cinder. But that was a pretty wobbly probably.

  Fortunately, I only had a second to think, which wasn’t long enough to reach an intelligent conclusion, so instead, I did the dumb thing. I kicked it.

  My foot did not explode. It smashed into the fireball, sending it flying out of the net flower and towards Minnie. She ducked.

  “Mom, can you make more of these?”

  “Sure, honey! I’m so glad you like them!”

  I picked up the one she had already made and ran towards Minnie, who had recovered enough to fire another ball at me. I caught it in the net, drop-kicked it, and shot it back.

  This time, Minnie was ready, and she dodged it easily, but I didn’t care. While I had kept her busy, Hungerford had knocked down two more goals. That left six.

  The fog was shaking like jelly in an earthquake. Some of it sloshed over the side of Minnie’s magic light box and floated away.

  And Mom had finished another flower. Little Ben ran over to her. In an attempt to stop him, Minnie shot a fireball, but she was a moment too late. Little Ben grabbed the flower and caught the fireball just in time. Then he punched the net and sent it flying right at Minnie, who dodged it again.

  “Little Ben! Go long!” I grabbed a fireball, passed it to Ben, and dodged another shot.

  Hungerford had knocked down two more goals. Four to go.

  “Go right! Catch! Shoot!”

  Two goals to go.

  I caught a fireball, punched it to Little Ben, caught another one, and kicked it at Minnie, so that it crackled at her from one side while Little Ben’s came from the other. She dropped down, letting the fireballs collide above her head.