Jack of Ravens

by Mark Chadbourn

  ‘What’s going on?’ Church asked.

  ‘I … I do not know. I had forgotten about you for so long.’ He came over to scan Church’s face before throwing his arms around Church. ‘I remember Stonehenge. And then I came here, to London. It seemed the most natural thing …’ He shook his head, dazed. ‘What happened to me?’

  ‘But you sent me an invitation. And you sent one to the Seelie Court. You said you had some information about the skull and the box.’

  Jerzy shook his head slowly. ‘I sent no invitations. I never gave my previous life a second thought.’ He plucked a silk dressing gown from a coat hanger and slipped it on before lighting himself a cigarette in a long holder. ‘Would you like a snout?’ he asked.

  Church had to smile at the comical image, but oddly Jerzy appeared more at home, and at ease, than he ever had before.

  ‘Looks like you’ve been carving out quite the niche for yourself,’ Church said.

  Jerzy’s face lit up so it was almost unrecognisable. ‘Church, you would not believe the wonder that has entered my life. Blimey, it’s a real thrill.’ His accent kept shifting between his natural Far Lands lilt and the cockney he had adopted for his act.

  ‘How did you get into it?’

  Jerzy thought for a moment, then shook his head. ‘All I remember is being an apprentice. Learning the ropes. Learning how to tell a gag. I have learned a lot of things.’ He grew pensive, and pointed to his mask. ‘I have learned that humour comes out of tragedy. That humour heals tragedy. I had everything good in my life stolen from me, the people I loved most of all. Every night the pain in my heart was so great I could not sleep. And then I found you, Church, and it eased a little, and then I found this.’ He wiped away a tear. ‘I feel at home with the show people. They accept my looks. They understand people may to all intents and purposes be different, yet at the same time be the same.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re happy, Jerzy.’

  ‘I am. I truly am. We find humour in the darkest places, and humour is hope. Music is hope. Laughter and mischief are hope. And they come when you least expect it. They form the path to Existence, Church, out of darkness and into the light. And they give the lie to Mr Darwin’s Theory of Evolution – yes, I have been reading! For it is possible to make the argument that we developed love to protect and develop the species, though I do not subscribe to that notion. But there is no argument for humour and song, except to uplift us spiritually. Blessed are the comic and the singer!’ He raised his hands to the air like an evangelical.

  ‘So you’re not coming back to the Court of the Soaring Spirit?’ Church said wryly.

  Jerzy jumped to his feet and paced the room exuberantly. ‘The wonders that exist here and now! Every night the Germans drop their bombs. People die by the thousands. Homes are destroyed. There is not enough food to go around. Children are shipped away from their families. But … once a week everyone gathers around their radio to listen to Tommy Handley … It’s That Man Again! If Mr Hitler chose to invade between eight-thirty and nine on a Thursday evening, he would have an easy job of it because everyone is tuned in to the show. You wouldn’t believe it could be funny when Mrs Mopp the Cleaner says every week – every week! – “Can I do yer now, sir?’’ But it is! Or when Colonel Chinstrap laconically meets every remark with, “I don’t mind if I do.” We all laugh and it brings us together. In the music halls there’s Flanagan and Allen singing “Underneath the Arches” … and Gracie Fields, and George Formby, and Max Miller …’

  His eyes took on a plangent cast. ‘No, Church, I am not going back. But if you ever need me, if there is anything I can ever do to help you in this great struggle that is unfolding, call me. I will come in an instant.’

  Church was touched. ‘You tell your jokes, Jerzy. The world needs more like you.’ In the moment’s silence that followed their friendship grew stronger still.

  ‘The questions remain, though,’ Church mused. ‘Who sent the invitation? Why did they want me here to see you, and what do they know about the skull and the box?’

  ‘And,’ Jerzy added, ‘are they from the same one who spirited me away from you at Stonehenge?’

  Before they could debate possible answers there was an outcry in the corridor. Jerzy grabbed his mask and ran out with Church to find an anxious man in a dinner jacket and bow tie, several stagehands and the escapologist’s pretty assistant.

  ‘Don’t worry, Max. We’re on top of it,’ the man in the dinner jacket said.

  ‘No, you’re bleedin’ not!’ the assistant shrieked. ‘He jumped right over the top of me!’

  ‘Who?’ Jerzy asked.

  ‘Just some gadabout who fancies a life on the stage,’ the dinner-jacketed man said with theatrical reassurance.

  ‘He was breathing blue fire!’ The assistant looked as if she was about to swoon. ‘He was wearing a black cape and he had eyes like the devil! He was flying … flying—’

  ‘Bouncing,’ one of the stagehands corrected.

  ‘Leaping,’ the assistant said, ‘like he was a bleedin’ India rubber man!’

  With that, the assistant finally did swoon, and the man in the dinner jacket caught her flamboyantly. The grizzled stagehand with the mop pushed his way forward. ‘You know who that is? That’s Spring-heeled Jack, that is. Hasn’t been seen round these parts for thirty year or more.’

  Church pulled Jerzy to one side. ‘Things are starting to make a lot more sense,’ he said.

  3

  ‘My Old Man (Said Follow the Van)’ was ringing around the auditorium as Church and Jerzy followed the trail of Spring-heeled Jack backstage. A man practising the trombone pointed them to the stage door, which hung open. Outside in the icy fog two women clutching each other in terror directed Church and Jerzy towards the East End.

  They hadn’t gone far when ear-piercing sirens rose up.

  ‘It’s another air raid,’ Jerzy said. ‘That’s why there’s a blackout – if the city is in darkness it is much more difficult for the bombers to find a target.’

  ‘I know what a blackout is, Jerzy.’

  ‘Ah. I forgot. This is all history to you.’

  ‘Come on, come on, lively up!’ An ARP warden brought his bicycle to a wobbly halt. ‘You don’t want to be out on the street with the Nazis dropping eggs on your bonces. Get down the Tube, pronto!’

  Jerzy grabbed Church and started to haul him in the direction of the nearest Underground station. ‘He is right, Church. I have seen what it is like. The fires blaze like the furnaces of the Court of the Final Word. Even if you are nowhere near the bomb blast it can tear you limb from limb. I have seen arms and legs lying in the gutter … men, women and children. We can search later.’

  ‘It’ll be too late then,’ Church said, but he knew Jerzy was right. They set off for the nearest Tube station, but after a few feet Church had a very strange feeling about the ARP Warden: something about him was familiar. He turned back, but the street was empty.

  4

  ‘You are a very strange creature, Ryan Veitch. I cannot quite fathom you.’ The Libertarian gnawed the last vestiges of his lamb dinner from a bone in the darkened second-floor room. Outside, the cry of, ‘Get that light out!’ rose up at irregular intervals.

  Wearing a too-sharp suit that made him resemble a local gangster, Veitch stood at the window looking out at the silhouette of the city skyscape. He lazily flipped a half-crown, a mannerism he’d picked up from a George Raft movie he’d seen at the Gaumont that afternoon. ‘What is there to understand?’ he said without looking back.

  ‘Hmm. Well, there is that. The point is, I feel you are completely lacking in self-awareness. Do you have any idea who you are?’ He tossed the lamb bone into the corner of the room. ‘You collude with our forces to bring about our ends, yet at the same time you’ll help some innocent or carry out some futile action to winnow the flame of hope. These two extremes are incompatible. Do you not comprehend that?’

  ‘Don’t know what you’re talking about, mate.’
/>
  The Libertarian sighed. ‘I really should know better.’ He stood up and stretched like a cat. ‘Are you coming to the ritual?’

  ‘Nah. Seen one, seen ’em all.’ In the distance, searchlights swept the sky. Veitch listened for the approaching drone as the Libertarian closed the door behind him. His footsteps disappeared down the creaking stairs.

  Sometimes Veitch’s thoughts felt like a black hole sucking him in, never to escape. He could understand the Libertarian’s confusion, for nothing appeared to make sense, either outside in the world or within him. He was a good person aspiring to good things – it was the reason why Existence chose him to be one of that most select band, a Brother of Dragons – yet nevertheless, here he was, murdering, destroying, tipping the scales towards the darkness.

  A column of flame rose up somewhere in the Kentish limits of the city. More indiscriminate deaths.

  His own killings, however, were not indiscriminate. They were not innocents, but combatants in a war who knew, or would know, that they were legitimate targets. Veitch held on to that thought tightly, for to let it slip away would mean facing up to unpalatable truths.

  He had been wronged, badly, and he should never forget that. Betrayed, when all he had offered was support for the cause, even at the risk of his own life. Treated badly by Ruth and Church, manipulating him even while they established their affair behind his back, secretly laughing at him. Ruth knew he loved her; Church knew he loved her. It didn’t mean anything in the long run, and if love was meaningless, the whole premise on which his membership of the Brotherhood of Dragons was based was a pack of lies. He couldn’t trust Existence at all; he could only trust himself, and what he wanted was revenge. That’s what he learned when he was growing up: if somebody hits you, you hit back harder. He wouldn’t be taken for a fool ever again.

  The sky was filled with the thunder of war machines. The nagging thoughts that threatened to strip away the façade from his justifications slipped back and were lost in the noise. He turned from the window, secure in the knowledge that he was on the right path.

  5

  People were flooding into the Tube as quickly as they had entered the Holborn Empire, but the mood now was tense and fearful. The half-lit platform was packed. People made themselves as comfortable as they could. Men smoked in silence, or whispered to their wives and children. Young couples gripped each other’s hands desperately, while the old folk huddled under blankets to keep warm. Babies woken from their cots were crying in unison, their voices merging into one constant wail.

  And then the bombs began to fall. It was the pounding of a great machine whose job was to reduce the city to dust. Thoom-thoom-thoom. Dust fell from the ceiling. The babies cried more, and whimpering young children joined them.

  Church looked around the faces and saw the dread grow stronger, reaching through the taut expressions and into their bones. He couldn’t begin to guess how they coped with the horror night after night for months on end.

  Suddenly a voice chimed up. ‘It’s Max Masque. Oi, Max! Tickle me ribs for a guinea!’

  ‘I’ll tickle yer ribs for a guinea!’ Jerzy responded. His eyes smiled at Church. ‘My public awaits.’

  ‘Go to it.’

  ‘How about a song?’ Jerzy called. A cheer went up. In a clear, strong voice, Jerzy began, ‘You are my sunshine, my only sunshine …’

  The whole platform joined in. ‘You make me happy when skies are grey …’

  Jerzy moved through the crowd, his very presence transformative. Church leaned against the wall, feeling the vibrations of the distant rhythm section shaking the city, marvelling in turn at how Jerzy had been transformed by his experience. One simple choice had made him something better.

  As he listened to the singing, Church noticed something flare briefly in the black mouth of the tunnel. It was bright blue, like the hissing flame of an acetylene torch. He could have dismissed it as men at work on the line, but it looked to him very much like the flaming breath of Spring-heeled Jack.

  While the sheltering crowd was distracted by Jerzy, Church slipped off the platform and, keeping close to the wall, edged his way into the tunnel. Rats scurried away from him into the depths. When he reached the point where he’d seen the flare, there was no sign of any workmen, but there was movement further along the tunnel.

  The emergency lights of the platform already looked distant. Church knew he would be crazy to venture any further into the tunnel, but another blue flare much further ahead drew him on.

  For the next fifteen minutes he progressed slowly through a deep, uncomfortable darkness, punctuated only at irregular points by emergency lights. The sounds of movement and the occasional flare kept him moving, but he never appeared to draw any closer.

  Then, on the edge of the illumination of one of the emergency lights, he came across a branching tunnel wide enough for two men to walk side by side. A security door hung open and inside chipped white tiles gleamed from a distant light. He could hear sounds coming from down the corridor.

  Inside, it smelled of engine oil. The corridor led past empty storerooms, and then through a ragged hole where the tiles gave way to new wood. Church could hear voices ahead, like flies buzzing in the distance.

  Eventually he came to a complex of rooms that he guessed were part of the civil defence system constructed in the early days of the war to house the government in case of devastating attack. They were newly built, the emergency lights still strung on temporary wires along the walls.

  One door stood ajar, and it was from inside that the voices emanated. Peering through the crack, Church could see a group of men in dark suits. Some of the mutterings he heard were in German, others in English. Beyond stood Salazar, his silver mask glowing in the half-light, and next to him was the Libertarian. Between them, on a wooden table, were the crystal skull and the Anubis Box. Church thought of coincidence and the vagaries of fate, and decided none of it mattered. This was his chance.

  The air was filled with a dark energy and heavy with anticipation. The gathered men were intense, as though they had been waiting for a long time. It felt as if something very bad indeed was going to happen. Another god was going to be summoned and corrupted. Which one? Church wondered. What new, dark powers would be lined up against him and his allies? He delved into his knowledge of mythology and then wished he hadn’t, shivering briefly at some of the dreadful possibilities.

  A man with a silver-grey moustache and florid jowls joined Salazar and the Libertarian and raised his hands to silence the congregation. ‘This time has been long coming,’ he said with the hint of a middle-European accent, ‘but here at this confluence of the old lines of power, we are in the right place. And after decades of waiting, events have conspired to make this the right time. The skull is now filled with power once again. We can begin the ritual. Are you ready?’

  A murmur ran around the room. The Libertarian eyed the assembled group with unconcealed contempt.

  Church wondered what the man meant by ‘the right place’. Was it simply that the energies were right for the ritual, or was the god they wanted to call somehow tied to the place of the summoning?

  ‘Tonight,’ the florid-jowled man continued in a tremulous voice, ‘we enter the halls of the Aesir. Tonight we dare to entice one of the great gods of our northern homeland – the trickster and shape-changer. Stand in awe – Loki comes.’

  Church felt another frisson. He didn’t know enough about the Northern gods to anticipate the threat of a corrupted Loki, but the excitement evident in the crowd made him think it would be worse than he could imagine.

  Salazar began his ritual before the crystal skull. Church threw off his overcoat and removed Llyrwyn from the harness on his back, but was still unsure how to proceed – there were too many people in the room to attempt to storm it. His window of opportunity was closing rapidly. If he didn’t disrupt the ritual before the god arrived, he wouldn’t stand a chance.

  Light shimmered across the ceiling and walls from the n
ow radiant skull. Shadows danced. The Libertarian and Salazar both moved back as the air began to peel open.

  As Church searched for a line of attack, he heard a voice at his ear: ‘Over here.’ In the confusion of light and sound from the ritual, he presumed he had imagined it, but his attention was drawn to a store cupboard on one wall. It had been closed when he arrived, but now the doors hung open. Inside was a large box of the flares the workmen carried in case of emergencies while they were working on the rails.

  As Church ignited one flare, he saw that Loki had emerged from the rift and Salazar was in the process of opening the Anubis Box. In the glare of the skull it was impossible to get a clear view of the god, but Church could still feel the power crackling off it.

  Church thrust the lit flare into the full box, kicked open the door and hurled the makeshift bomb into the midst of the rapt crowd. He slammed the door briefly as the box ignited with a thunderous explosion.

  When he darted inside there was horrific confusion. Men were on fire and screaming, and the air was filled with thick, foul-smelling smoke. Gripping his sword, Church drove through the stumbling bodies.

  Salazar appeared out of the billowing clouds. As he had done once before, Church swung his sword and cleaved the thing from shoulder to hip. The blade met as little resistance as he expected. Spiders gushed across the floor.

  And then Church was at the table where the crystal skull burned with an intense inner power. Beyond it, Church glimpsed feral eyes and a face marked with black runes carved into it by the Anubis Box. The god let out a bestial growl.

  Church brought his blade down on the crystal skull and shattered it in an explosion of white light. Half-blinded even though he had shielded his eyes at the last, Church fumbled for the box. When his fingers closed on it, he ran to the wall, hoping to follow it around to the door while everyone else was disoriented by the smoke. Instead he came across another door. He wrenched it open and entered a shaft with a winding metal staircase.