by P. G. Bell
Confusion overtook Meridian’s anger. “What about my head?”
“My friend Ursel is about to hit you on it.”
Meridian spun around, raising his wand to defend himself, but as Suzy had hoped, Ursel’s reflexes were quicker. She raised her great paws, still in their cuffs, and brought them around as one in a wide arc, catching Meridian on the side of the head and lifting him off his feet. He sailed through the air and collided with a bookcase.
“Run!” shouted Suzy, already making for the door. Meridian’s answer rang in her head, and she could already feel a host of others clicking into place around it. She hoped they were the right answers. Because everything depended on them.
32
THE LIAR, THE WITCH, AND THE WAR ZONE
Suzy, Stonker, Ursel, and Frederick made it to the exit before Meridian staggered out of his office, shouting orders at the observers, some of whom rose from their seats but were otherwise too surprised or timid to act. Suzy locked eyes with Meridian for a second before the door swung shut behind her, and felt very glad of the distance between them; his face was set in a look of stern fury that sent a shiver of dread right through her.
“Where are we going?” wailed Frederick as she hammered the button to call the elevator. She heard it clanking up the shaft toward them and hoped it would be quick enough.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “We’ll find another way of changing you back, I promise. But I had to find out what Meridian knew.”
“You promised the last time,” he muttered.
“It’s better than getting your brain wiped clean, m’boy,” said Stonker, casting anxious glances back over his shoulder toward the Observatory door. “At least you’re still you. After a fashion.”
The elevator arrived, and Ursel bundled them all in through the doors before they were even fully open. Suzy thumbed the button to take them back down to the library. At the other end of the corridor, the Observatory door swung open to reveal Meridian, his cane raised and its tip fizzing with magic.
“Get back!” shouted Stonker. They pressed themselves to the walls as the blast from Meridian’s cane struck the back of the elevator, missing the end of Suzy’s nose by inches and leaving a smoldering mark that smelled of wet garbage.
“I demand that you stop this!” barked Meridian. They heard his footsteps approaching up the corridor at a run, but the doors slid shut and the elevator jerked into motion. Suzy wiped a bead of sweat from her brow.
“Well, I can’t say I think much of his hospitality,” said Stonker. “Chap like that should be able to afford a few more manners.” Ursel growled in agreement.
“You still haven’t told me where we’re going,” said Frederick. “And why did you ask him about Crepuscula? What’s she got to do with anything?”
“You tell me,” said Suzy. “You told me she was planning to conquer the Impossible Places.”
“No, I told you someone was planning to conquer them. You’re the one who assumed it was Crepuscula. I just didn’t correct you.”
“Why on earth not?” she said.
“Because I knew Meridian might be watching us,” he said. “And the less you knew about his plans, the less reason he’d have to hurt you. It might have worked, too, if you hadn’t just blurted everything out right in front of him.”
“How was I supposed to know that?” she said, although the flush in her cheeks was as much due to embarrassment as anger. She’d never even suspected he’d been trying to protect her. “And anyway,” she said, wanting to get past the feeling, “I still don’t really know how you ended up inside that snow globe.”
“Or on the Express, for that matter,” said Stonker. “Not that it’s any of my business what people put in the mail, but you’re at the unusual end of the scale.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” Frederick said. “Crepuscula sent me a NeuroGlobe to store all the information I was gathering for her on the Observatory project. I was supposed to fill it up and send it back to her, but once I realized what was really going on here, I didn’t dare. If the Observatory was a tool for controlling the Impossible Places, she could never be allowed to find out about it. If she took power, she’d be an even worse ruler than Meridian.”
“So what did you do instead?” said Suzy.
“I told you,” he said. “I ran away. I couldn’t stay here, and I couldn’t go to Crepuscula, so I decided to take care of things myself. You remember what Meridian said about people being harder to manipulate if they know they’re being manipulated? I thought that if I could tell the whole Union what was going on, the people would rise up together and throw Meridian out of power. Then I’d be a hero, and my parents would have to welcome me back. ‘Our son, Freddie, he saved the Union, you know.’ All I needed was somewhere safe to hide while I figured out how to open the NeuroGlobe, so I slipped out through the garbage chute one night and stowed away on a train home.”
“Why did you need to open the NeuroGlobe?” she said. “You’d already been using it.”
“Crepuscula had put a lock spell on it,” he said. “I could put things into it, but I couldn’t get them out again. Not without the correct incantation, anyway. I should have guessed she’d add a few other security measures as well.”
“Like what?”
“Like the curse,” he said sadly. “When I couldn’t unlock the globe, I tried smashing it open with a hammer. The next thing I knew I was inside it, looking out.”
Suzy looked at him with fresh understanding. “You mean you’re the NeuroGlobe?”
“Sort of. It trapped me inside and then disguised itself. Crepuscula’s little joke.”
“But that still doesn’t explain how you ended up on our train,” said Stonker.
Suzy got the sense that Frederick was gathering himself for something difficult. “My parents,” he said at last, very quietly. “They boxed me up and mailed me to Crepuscula. I begged them not to, but she’d already offered them the reward money she’d promised me. I suppose they wanted to be rich, too.”
Suzy didn’t know what to say. She still wasn’t sure whether she liked Frederick much, but she was certainly starting to feel sorry for him. After all, he had tried to do the right thing in keeping the NeuroGlobe from Crepuscula, even if it had all really been to impress his parents. Perhaps that had been selfish in a way, but then she thought of her own parents. They had never made her feel worthless or unwelcome and would certainly never try to sell her. Frederick wasn’t so lucky, and she vowed that if she ever made it back, she would never do anything to annoy them ever again. Probably.
A dull boom somewhere close by shook the elevator in its shaft, and they could hear a fizz and crackle of what sounded like lightning. The smell of smoke reached them from somewhere.
“Hold on,” said Suzy. “This is it.”
The elevator bounced to a stop, the doors opened, and they stepped out into a war zone.
* * *
The Lunar Guard were arranged in a line across the nearest side of the library’s central reading room, their plasma rifles blasting streams of white-hot energy into the phalanx of statues bearing down on them.
The statues boiled into magma where the energy hit them, and the air was filled with foul-smelling steam. Every few seconds one of the statues stumbled and fell, shattering to rubble, only for another to step forward and fill the gap. And so their line advanced, inexorably, one thudding step after another.
“If anyone’s got any Pop Bottles left, use them now!” shouted Neoma. She was in the center of the guards’ line, her gold tooth flashing as she blew a statue’s head to slush.
Suzy and the others ducked as a handful of small glass bottles filled with bright green liquid arced through the air, detonating in bursts of vivid fire as they struck the statues. Half a dozen of the stone figures were blown to pieces, and the rest were thrown to the ground by the force of the explosions.
The guns fell silent as the guards ducked and covered, and for a second the only sound Suzy could hear through th
e ringing of her ears was the whir of shrapnel ricocheting off the wall behind her.
“Wish me luck,” she whispered to the others. Then, before they could stop her, she dashed past Neoma and into the battle-scarred no-man’s-land between the opposing forces. “Stop!” Suzy shouted.
“Help!” yelled Frederick. “She’s trying to get me killed!”
Nobody listened. The surviving statues were already climbing to their feet, their line closing up once more. Suzy heard the hum of the guards’ rifles behind her, ready for the last stand.
“Ready!” barked Neoma. “Take aim!”
She never got any farther. Before she could give the order to fire, something quick and black raced out from between the statues’ feet, slipping across the floor in dark tendrils that seized three of the guards in quick succession. They fell, screaming, into darkness, leaving nothing behind, and Suzy was momentarily overcome by the memory of Wilmot’s last moments.
“Fall back!” shouted Neoma.
“Suzy! Get away from there!” Stonker yelled. Ursel roared.
Suzy screwed her eyes shut. If her plan was going to work, it had to work now.
“Crepuscula!” she shouted at the top of her lungs. Frederick whimpered.
“Well?” came the too-familiar voice. “I’m waiting.”
Suzy opened her eyes.
Crepuscula stood there, hands folded over the head of her cane. The sight of her banished Suzy’s fear in an instant, replacing it with a burning hatred that she found much harder to control—here was the woman who had killed Wilmot. Suzy wanted to scream at her, to charge at her with Fletch’s wand, but she bit her tongue and planted her feet more firmly among the rubble. “I’m here to return your NeuroGlobe,” she said.
Crepuscula eyed the snow globe with guarded interest. “As simple as that?”
“No,” said Suzy. “Once you’ve changed him back, you’re going to let Frederick, me, Ursel, and Stonker go unharmed. Promise me that, and all the evidence that Frederick collected is yours.”
“Perhaps I don’t want it anymore,” said Crepuscula. “I’ve already seized the Tower, after all.”
“Not yet, you haven’t,” Neoma growled. Crepuscula gave her a pitying look.
“If all you wanted was the Ivory Tower, you would have brought your army here ages ago,” said Suzy. “But you didn’t, which means you’re here for the NeuroGlobe instead.”
Crepuscula raised an eyebrow, and then her cane, pointing the tip at Suzy’s forehead. “You’ve tried so hard to keep him from me. What’s changed?”
“I learned the truth,” said Suzy. “Lord Meridian is controlling the Union. I thought you wanted to as well, but he says that’s not why you’re here.”
“And why do you believe him?”
“Because he didn’t want to tell me,” said Suzy. “I think that means you’re trying to stop him.”
A little smile of satisfaction teased the corners of Crepuscula’s mouth, though the tip of the cane didn’t waver. “Of course I am, you silly girl. Did you think I’d been trying to get Frederick back for the pleasure of his company?”
Suzy heard the guards fanning out behind her, taking up better positions. The skin on her back began to crawl; if they opened fire, she would be caught between them and their target. If they hit her, there wouldn’t be much of her left. “You need the evidence he gathered,” she said. “But why? How is it going to help you?”
“Because this isn’t an attack.” It was Lord Meridian’s voice, and everyone turned as he made his way into the reading room, stepping between the guards and coming to a halt beside Suzy. “It’s an arrest. She wants to lock me away, but she knows she can’t do it without evidence, don’t you, Selena?”
Suzy started. She hadn’t considered that Crepuscula might have a first name, nor that anyone would ever dare use it to her face, but Crepuscula seemed unfazed.
“You’ve gone too far, Aybek,” Crepuscula said. “Mother always warned me you would. As keeper of the Obsidian Tower, it’s my duty to intervene.”
“Duty,” he scoffed. “You couldn’t wait to come crashing in here. You’ve always been the same, ever since we were children. Whatever I do, you have to best it or destroy it. Well, it stops today.”
“Wait.” Suzy looked between them in astonishment. “Are you two … brother and sister?”
“Twins,” said Crepuscula. “Non-identical.”
“Thank goodness,” said Meridian. “Imagine sharing that face.” Crepuscula gave him a mocking smile in return.
“But you’ve got different names,” said Suzy.
“Different titles,” said Crepuscula. “They come with the towers. Along with certain responsibilities.” She directed this last word at Meridian.
“My responsibility is to improve the Impossible Places,” said Meridian. “Which is precisely what I’m doing.”
“He means he’s been watching people,” said Suzy. “Spying on their leaders, so he can make them do what he wants.”
Crepuscula nodded. “I thought it might be something like that. Did you really think I wouldn’t notice when you turned your spyglasses on me, Aybek? My fillings vibrated.”
Meridian frowned. “The result of bad dentistry, no doubt.”
“Spare me,” she said. “Magic of that strength is difficult to hide from an expert, even from a distance. And I started to notice it everywhere I went, from one Place to another. That’s why I was able to make contact with young Frederick. He turned his attentions on his parents’ farm so often I could smell the residual magic a mile away. All I had to do was stand there in the yard and wait for him to spot me.” She spared Frederick a withering glance. “And if he hadn’t had ideas above his station, I would have already put a stop to all this nonsense.”
“I’m sorry,” Frederick said in a low moan. “I thought you were going to take the Observatory for yourself. Just please let me go and I’ll never break a promise again. I promise!” This prompted a derisive snort from Neoma.
“Your word isn’t worth much,” said Crepuscula. Her glare slipped from Frederick to Suzy. “Yours, on the other hand…”
Suzy bristled—she could see the old woman’s thoughts slotting into place behind those lilac eyes.
“I may be prepared to accept your proposal,” said Crepuscula, “on one condition.”
“What?” said Suzy.
“I will let your friends go,” she said, “if you take Frederick’s place inside the snow globe.”
Suzy heard the others gasp, and Ursel growl, but it all seemed very far away. This one huge horrible thought rang in her mind like a bell, drowning out everything else.
“A few years on my mantelpiece might do you good,” Crepuscula continued. “Or maybe the boiler room, if I get tired of you. It might just teach you to respect your elders and betters.”
At this, a tiny voice cut through the din in Suzy’s mind. It belonged to the fury she had been keeping in check throughout the confrontation, and it had lots of things to say. She knew that saying them would be a very bad idea, but she no longer cared. What else could Crepuscula do to her?
“Betters?” she said, feeling the blood rushing to her cheeks. “What makes you think you’re better than anyone?”
“I’m not a thief, for one thing,” said Crepuscula.
“No,” said Suzy. “You’re a monster.”
Crepuscula didn’t react, but her shadow did. It darkened and flexed, drawing other shadows to it until the floor was black with them. Meridian leveled his wand at Crepuscula, prompting the statues to take a crashing step forward, swords raised. The guards braced themselves. But Suzy persisted.
“I don’t care if you’re here to do the right thing—you don’t want to be respected. You just want to be feared. You bully people, threaten them, and leave a trail of destruction wherever you go. You don’t deserve my respect, and I’ll never give it to you. Not after what you did to Wilmot.”
Crepuscula’s brow furrowed. “Wil-what?”
�
��The Postmaster,” said Suzy. “In Trollville. Do you even remember him?”
For a few seconds, it was clear that she didn’t. “Do you mean that fussy little boy with the complaint form?”
“He was my friend,” said Suzy. “And you killed him.”
“I did nothing of the sort.”
“You did,” said Suzy, her eyes pricking with angry tears. “I saw you.”
“Did you?” Crepuscula raised her free hand and clicked her fingers. Everyone flinched, expecting some outburst of magic, but instead they heard a distant cry of alarm. Suzy and the others looked around, trying to pinpoint the source of the noise, but it seemed to come from nowhere. It grew rapidly louder, and closer, until the shadow on the floor shivered, heaved, and spat something large and flailing straight up into the air. The thing crashed back down to earth at Suzy’s feet, and she looked down into Wilmot’s startled face.
“Hello,” he said, rubbing his head. “Could someone tell me what’s happening?”
“Wilmot!” Suzy fell to her knees and threw her arms around him, almost dropping Frederick in her haste.
“I see you looked after my hat,” he said.
“I thought you were dead!” she exclaimed. “What happened to you?”
“I just slipped him into a spare pocket dimension I like to carry with me,” said Crepuscula. “It seemed quicker than dealing with all that paperwork. Honestly, I don’t know what all the fuss is about.”
“Postmaster!” Stonker arrived at a run, quickly followed by Ursel, and tried to clap Wilmot on the shoulder. His hands were still fastened together, though, so the gesture was more like a clumsy karate chop, which almost sent the young troll sprawling. “I never thought I’d set eyes on you again.”
Ursel had just enough freedom with her handcuffs to slip her huge arms over the crew and squash them together in the most literal bear hug Suzy had ever experienced.
“Delightful,” said Crepuscula. “Now hurry up and make your choice, girl. You’ve wasted enough of my day as it is.” The air between her cane and Meridian’s fizzed with suppressed magic.
