The Eye of the North

by Sinead O'Hart

  “D’you ever put that awkward-lookin’ thing down?” said Thing, nodding at the satchel. He sniffed wetly. “Anyway. Are ya in or not?”

  Emmeline thought about it for a few seconds.

  “Well—what does it involve?” she asked, keeping a tight grip on her satchel.

  Thing grinned again, and then, without giving Emmeline any chance to prepare herself, he jumped down from the bed, grabbed her hand, and started running for the door.

  “So, what’s in the bag, then?”

  “It’s not a bag. It’s a satchel. My satchel.”

  “What’s in the satchawatsit, then?”

  “Stuff. I need. To keep me safe.”

  Thing snorted. “What about this, up here?” He tapped Emmeline on her forehead. “Or these?” He pulled at her sleeve, shaking her arm about. “Them’s what keep a body safe, y’know. Not an overgrown handbag.”

  “Satchel. It’s not a hard word.”

  “Yeah. Well,” said Thing sagely. He sniffed and stared out to sea. “Hey, I wonder if we’ll see any icebergs?” He sat up, straight and alert, on the lookout. They were lying in a quiet nook near the front of the ship, far from the first-class decks, sheltered by thick coils of rope and mostly hidden behind a large pipe. They’d spent hours exploring (or, rather, poking about where they didn’t belong while dodging anyone in uniform). When they’d grown bored, they decided to camp out while they figured out what to do next. They hadn’t come up with anything, and now dusk was closing in. It had been a long day, in every way imaginable.

  Emmeline blinked. “I don’t think they get this far down without breaking up, do they?” Thing just shrugged in reply, his shoulders slumping again. Emmeline sat up and gazed out across the expanse of water all around the ship, scouring it for any sight of the fabled ice mountains that were reputed to haunt the seas. Nobody (at least, nobody that had ever taken the time to explain it to her) seemed to understand why, but the frozen places of the world had been crumbling away for years, slowly sending white, freezing peaks into the oceans. They gradually melted as they went, raising the sea levels and, bit by bit, changing the weather into a cold, bad-tempered thing. It had started gradually, many years before, so nobody had bothered to do anything about it; now, Emmeline knew, it was happening so fast that it was changing the world for good, altering coastlines and destroying towns and cities, and it seemed hard to know where to start in putting things right. She didn’t like to think about it much, but she knew her parents were worried, particularly since it had suddenly seemed to grow much worse over the past year or so. Or, she thought with a pang, it did worry them, before.

  “In the old days, you know, the voyage to France was much shorter. Less water to cross. And Paris was a lot farther inland then,” she said, trying to drown out her mind.

  “Wouldn’t know much about it,” said Thing.

  “Well, yeah. Me neither.” Emmeline sighed. Several quiet moments passed, punctuated by nothing but the skraaawk of seagulls overhead.

  “This ain’t much of an adventure, is it?” Thing said, hopping up. Quick as anything, he wriggled between the bars of the ship’s railing and swung out over the water, holding on by just his knees, his feet braced against the edge of the deck. “Whoo!” he yelled, bucking with the movement of the ship. “This is more like it!” He glanced back at Emmeline, who was too rigid with fear to notice the glint in his eye.

  “Get in here, will you!” she shouted. “You’ll fall!”

  “Won’t either,” called Thing.

  “You will! You could lose your balance, or faint, or anything!”

  “Nah! I’m too clever for all that. Watch me!” Thing leaned farther out, his body like a bowsprit sticking out of the side of the ship. He laughed, his hair gluing to his face in thick, damp clumps.

  Emmeline felt her heart knock against her collarbone. “Please! Please! Don’t fall!”

  “Or what? What do you care?” shouted Thing, his eyes bright.

  “I don’t care, I just—hey!” As Emmeline spoke, Thing’s foot slipped—or seemed to. Before she knew what she was doing, she flung herself forward and grabbed his hand with both her own. She hauled him upright and then back through the railing where they lay together on the slick deck, panting and cold and tingling with exhilaration and terror. Thing looked at Emmeline and grinned, throwing her a wink. She just stared at him, breathing hard.

  “Hey,” he said. “You let go of yer satchel, finally.” Emmeline was too busy trying to calm her heart to reply straightaway, but the realization that he was right jerked through her body.

  “And you learned to say the word, finally,” she muttered. She sat up and crawled over to where her satchel lay, then opened it to check that everything was as it should be.

  “Yeah. Good with words, me,” said Thing with a chuckle. Emmeline just sat there, dragging her satchel across her lap like it was a pet dog. She looked over at her strange companion and frowned, feeling somehow that she’d been outsmarted and not knowing why.

  “So, why are you even on this ship? Where are your parents?” she asked, folding herself up small and trying to force her teeth not to chatter.

  “Might ask you the same thing,” said Thing. He settled himself, cross-legged, on the deck beside her, sweeping his hair out of his face with a wet hand.

  “Well, I…,” Emmeline began. “It’s sort of hard to explain.” Particularly when you don’t understand it yourself, she thought, picking absentmindedly at a loose thread on the buckle of her satchel.

  “Fascinatin’ story, that,” said Thing after a minute. “My own tale, well, it’s fairly similar. I’m here because I’m here, and I intend to stay here until someone realizes I’m not s’posed to be here and throws me overboard.” He sniffed good-naturedly and flashed Emmeline his ever-present grin. Somehow it made her feel a little better.

  “Well, I guess we’re in the same boat, then,” she said, glancing at him.

  “Oh, an’ a comedian, too,” said Thing with a snort. “We’ll need to work on yer joke tellin’ if this here arrangement is goin’ to get anywhere.”

  “Arrangement?” she echoed, looking back at him properly.

  “You know. Me savin’ you from terminal boredom.”

  “I think I’d rather be back at home,” she said with a sigh.

  “Ouch,” said Thing, chuckling. “Not that bad, am I?”

  Emmeline grinned through a deep yawn. “Can we pick this up tomorrow?” she asked. Her tiny cabin with its rickety bed seemed irresistibly inviting, suddenly.

  “Don’t see why not,” he replied, getting to his feet in one smooth movement. He offered Emmeline his hand, but she and her satchel struggled up unaided. They set off in weary silence, and remained that way until they’d almost reached Emmeline’s door. They’d just turned the final corner when, without warning, Thing stopped short. Emmeline walked into his back.

  “Hey! Wait!” he whispered, dragging Emmeline out of sight.

  “Not now, all right? I’m wet, and I’m sleepy, and I want to get out of these clothes—”

  “Yeah, well, you’re gonna be all those things and dead to boot if you don’t shut it and stay hid!” said Thing between gritted teeth. “Just get over ’ere!” Emmeline rolled her eyes and slapped herself up against the wall beside Thing, clutching her satchel close.

  “Y’see?” hissed Thing, nodding up toward her door. “Fellas movin’! Doin’ stuff!”

  Emmeline leaned out around him and looked. She could hear muffled thumping and raised voices coming from her cabin. A fluttering piece of fabric rustled out the door like a dying bird, and she saw with some embarrassment that it was her nightgown.

  “Fancy,” muttered Thing as it flapped sadly in the breeze before vanishing into the murky evening.

  “Don’t start,” she replied.

  “Are you, like, rich, or what?” he asked in a low voice.

  “Not especially.”

  “Enough for those blokes to be rippin’ your room to bits?”<
br />
  Emmeline frowned. “Wouldn’t have thought so.”

  “Right. Well, we’ve got to get out of here, ain’t we?”

  “What? Why? I can’t leave all my things just—” At this, a large, bald-headed figure came striding out of Emmeline’s cabin, a suitcase under each arm. He walked to the ship’s railing and grabbed the handle of each bag. Then, without a second’s hesitation, he shook them out like he was beating dust out of a carpet. Emmeline’s belongings—her clothes, her shoes, her hairbrush, her favorite teddy bear for those nights when the darkness got a little bit too dark, her toothbrush, and at least five spare pairs of socks—tumbled out into the sea, lost forever in the churning water. The empty suitcases followed soon after.

  Emmeline felt like someone had kicked her. “Hey!” she shouted before she could stop herself. The man jerked and turned, his meaty arms swinging.

  “What are you—did you just—you did, didn’t you?” spluttered Thing, pulling at Emmeline’s sleeve. She didn’t move.

  “Oi!” yelled the man, shouting over his shoulder. “Out ’ere!” A crash, followed by a muffled scuffling, sounded from the cabin, and shadows skittered across the deck as people—large people—started moving toward the door. The bald man took two long strides in their direction, growling as he came.

  “An’ that’s our cue to go. Go!” Emmeline felt Thing shove her out of their hiding place. His grip around her arm was like iron as he dragged her away.

  “But we’ve got to—” she started to say, her eyes fixed on the light being thrown through her door. Her door, with her things inside!

  “I ain’t got to do nothin’,” said Thing. “Come on, will ya?”

  Emmeline turned, shaking off Thing’s hand, and with that, they were gone.

  “Come on!” yelled Thing, his voice barely audible. “This way!” They were running along a metal catwalk suspended high in the air. Beneath their feet were massive turbines, slowly and hugely turning, and the whole place was oppressively hot and smoky and steamy, and the noise—well, the noise was unbearable. In the gloom it was all Emmeline could do to follow Thing, keep herself from falling over, and hang on to the satchel.

  Eventually they reached a plain, boring-looking door without markings or inscriptions and with a round window set into it. Thing barreled through it like a rugby player making an illegal tackle. As soon as it swung closed behind them, the noise was dampened enough for the ringing in Emmeline’s ears to settle into a faint buzz.

  “You all right?” shouted Thing.

  “I—yes!” she called back, her mind in a muddle. “Where are we?”

  “Engine room,” said Thing before letting out a wet, rattling cough. “C’mon—those blokes could be on us any minute.” Following him down through a warren of passageways and staircases, Emmeline was sure they’d gone so deep into the ship that they were going to emerge on the other side of it.

  “Nearly there!” he gasped after they’d been running for at least ten minutes, their feet clanking on the metal floor.

  “How much farther?” Emmeline replied, barely able to speak. Her insides felt all jiggled about, like she was a doll in the hands of a particularly angry child.

  “Just up here. C’mon. You can rest. Safe. Promise!” His words were coming in tight bursts. Emmeline forced her heavy legs to move, and within a minute they were inside another tiny room, dark and still, quiet except for a distant low rumble, and Thing was barricading the door with a mop handle.

  “Jus’ a minute,” he said, his breath now sounding like great whoops. “I’ll jus’—whoop—get the door—whoop—shut, and then we can light a—whoop—candle. Okay?”

  “Are you all right?” she said, leaning in to help him with the mop. Together, they got it tight against the door. It wasn’t nearly as good as a padlock, but it would have to do. “Your breathing sounds funny.”

  “Don’ worry ’bout it,” he croaked. “Be all right in a—whoop—minute.” He tested the mop one last time, coughing as quietly as he could, before stepping away from the door. “Right. That’s done it.” Thing led her to a corner, and they flopped onto the floor. As Emmeline made sure her satchel was safe, Thing lit an old candle stub, and in the gentle glow of the flame Emmeline could finally look around.

  They were in what looked like an old storeroom—all manner of bits and bobs and odds and ends had been thrown in it, higgledy-piggledy. She saw more mops and brushes and mirrors and bedsteads and crockery and kitchen appliances and old uniforms and mismatched shoes and, most unusually, a stuffed and mounted stag’s head, which looked exceedingly old and in need of patching up. Thing tucked a blanket around her, and she accepted it gratefully. As it warmed her up, she realized that her legs were not only cold and damp but also cramped and sore and jittery from her long, unexpected run.

  They spent several minutes alone with their thoughts in the candlelight. Thing’s breathing returned to normal, and Emmeline’s heart stopped galloping like an escaped rhinoceros.

  “So, d’you want to tell me what’s going on?” said Thing eventually.

  “How am I supposed to know?” she replied, wrapping herself up as tightly as she could.

  “You could at least thank me for savin’ yer,” he pointed out.

  “I didn’t…” Emmeline bit back what she wanted to say—which was something like I didn’t even ask you to get involved!—because, firstly, it was a bit unfair and, secondly, she was grateful to Thing for spotting those men. Also, she thought, if he hadn’t dragged her off on this so-called adventure, she’d have been there, in her cabin, when they burst in. A cold shiver ran up and down her spine.

  “Thank you, Thing,” she muttered.

  “Yep,” he said. She could hear that his grin was back. “So, what’s the plan now? We won’t be in Par-ee till the day after tomorrow, prob’ly. Can’t go back to yer room, can yer?”

  “I suppose not,” said Emmeline grayly.

  “Yer welcome to stay here, o’course,” said Thing, gesturing around.

  “Well—thanks.” She glanced up, and the stuffed stag caught her eye again, making her look away fast. “So, is this where you live? Like, all the time?” She settled herself more comfortably on the floor and placed her satchel within reach.

  “Nah, not all the time,” replied Thing. “Jus’ while I’m on board this partickler ship, but I’ve made, shall we say, sev’ral crossin’s courtesy of this fine vessel. Best ’ome I’ve ever ’ad, but I don’t want t’push me luck too far. When she docks this time, I’ll be off into Par-ee to make me fortune. Jus’ you watch!” He smiled, and in the candlelight Emmeline could pretend she couldn’t see the fear in his eyes.

  “Don’t you have parents?” she said, swallowing a lump as she thought about her own.

  “Must’ve done, once,” answered Thing reasonably. “Why are we talkin’ about me, anyway? Thought you were the one with the criminal record.”

  “I don’t have a criminal record. I’m a kid!”

  “No reason why you can’t have a criminal record. Pretty sure I had one when I were your age.”

  Emmeline glared at him. “How old are you now?”

  “Older’n you,” he answered unhelpfully.

  Emmeline huffed out a thwarted sigh. “So, how do you get food and things?” she asked, before yawning so widely that she felt sure her head was about to pop off.

  “I liberate it, shall we say, from them as has a little bit more’n they need.”

  “You mean you steal it.”

  “In a manner of speakin’.”

  “You’re sure we’re safe here?” The candle was beginning to gutter and flicker. Emmeline shivered, pulling the blanket tighter around her. She thought of her poor teddy, drowned at the bottom of the ocean, and of her parents, wherever they were, and squeezed her eyes tight shut, wondering why they were suddenly starting to sting.

  “Yeah,” answered Thing after a few seconds. “I ain’t never had no trouble down ’ere. Nobody ever comes down this far no more. Don’t r
eckon those blokes as trashed your cabin could even find us. Maybe it’s all a big misunderstandin’ anyway.”

  “Do you think that’s all it is?” She yawned. Gravity was sucking at her eyelids, and things were starting to get a little blurry around the edges. Her arms and legs felt heavy, and she was so cozy under the blanket that she was asleep before Thing answered her.

  “No, little scrap,” he said into the darkness. “I don’t think it’s no misunderstandin’.”

  After a few minutes he blew out the candle, checked that Emmeline’s satchel was safe and secure, and settled himself down beside her. It took a while for thoughts like Leave the kid here! Grab the bag an’ sell what you can out of it! What’re you doin’, you turnip? to stop whirling about inside his brain, but eventually they left him alone.

  Then he slept, and the ship sailed on into the night.

  Emmeline woke up alone. With a jolt she remembered her satchel and flipped herself over so she could see it—but it was there, all right, looking exactly the same as it had the day before.

  Check it, said a little voice in her head. Check that everything’s in it! But she squished that thought away and busied herself waiting for Thing to come back.

  As it turned out, that took a bit longer than she’d anticipated.

  There was no real way to tell time in the storeroom. The only clock was a large, broken thing lying on its side in one corner; it read twenty-three minutes past two and probably had for years. All Emmeline had to go on was her stomach, which finally began to growl—and still, Thing didn’t appear.

  Emmeline had finally decided she couldn’t wait any longer, and had just about gathered up enough courage to leave the room by herself when Thing came barreling in as though Genghis Khan were on his heels. He slammed the door closed behind him, and with fumbling hands he replaced their security mop.

  “Hey! Is everything—”

  “Shhh! Whoop!” said Thing, putting a finger to his lips.

  “But—”