Ink Black Magic

by Tansy Rayner Roberts

  Sherrie laughed heartily. “I’ll say. You were rude to Lord Sinistre, I wouldn’t forget that in a hurry. Although I did, didn’t I? Until now.”

  “He must have forgotten, too.”

  “Lucky for you! I’ve never seen him so purple. Don’t imagine anyone had been so rude to him in his whole life. I remember you shouting about another world, all bright colours and such. But then you settled down and got on with being Chamberlain. You never mentioned where you’d come from again.”

  “I forgot,” Aragon said softly. “I forgot who I was.”

  “Funny what you forget, isn’t it?” mused Sherrie. “I thought I’d always remember you being rude to Lord Sinistre, but I haven’t given it a moment’s thought until you mentioned it just now.”

  “Funny what you forget,” Aragon agreed. He stood up, leaving the remains of his cheesy toast. “Sorry, Sherrie. I’ve lost my appetite. Better go look at the state of the accounts after that damned ball.”

  “Don’t forget that those demons in Brimstone Street are charging extra for violets and nasturtium flowers,” said Sherrie. “Honestly, at those prices you’d think they grew the dratted things instead of just magicking them out of thin air.”

  “I’ll have a word with them,” Aragon promised. “We’ll see if they still insist on the price rise after I tell them the Palace demons are close to cracking flower magic. They made half a bluebell yesterday.”

  “Are bluebells edible?”

  “It’s amazing how edible people think something is when you coat it in sugar.”

  “You’re telling me,” Sherrie giggled. “That’s one of my favourite tricks. I say, have you seen his Lordship’s supper guest? I had a peek at her when she came in the front door. Such a lovely girl, I hope it all works out for them. It would ever so nice to have a proper Lady of Drak. And a wedding! Wouldn’t I just love to get my hands on a wedding feast.”

  “Well, now,” said Aragon. “That would be an amazing thing.”

  Sherrie gave him a surprised look. “You sounded almost sarcastic there, Chamberlain. That isn’t like you.”

  “So I hear,” he sighed.

  After Aragon left, Singespitter slunk out of his hiding place. He wasn’t sure if he had discovered anything useful from that little exchange. Time to see if Drak had a library.

  To Singespitter, old parchment was almost as easy to track by scent as magic and cheesy toast. He trotted away from the kitchens, sniffing madly. Aha. That smelled promising. If he didn’t discover anything useful, at least he could find something to read until Kassa was finished with her intimate supper. It was a plan with no drawbacks.

  ***

  The violet-drenched oysters with rose-scented wine were exquisite. So were the prawn slivers in hazelnut syrup and the braised peacock’s tongues with peach-cantaloupe dressing. Exquisite, elegant, delicate… Kassa was starting to long for steak and mashed potato or a toasted cheese sandwich, something she could wrap her mouth around. At this rate, they could be eating for weeks before she felt full.

  Then again, intimate suppers were not just about food. They were also about flirtation, and Kassa was getting extra helpings of that.

  Lord Sinistre flattered. He growled compliments in that sultry voice of his, and gazed at Kassa as if she were the most intriguing, fascinating person he had ever met. She knew he was insincere, he just had to be, but the damn man wasn’t letting his act slip.

  And he was wearing leather. A gorgeous man in black leather, with smouldering eyes and a sexy voice, who just happened to rule a city. Kassa couldn’t help enjoying herself.

  Except…

  He really hadn’t let anything slip. Not a crumb, not a clue. No hint about what Drak was, why it was here, or whether Lord Sinistre even knew the answer to such questions. It was difficult for Kassa to justify her presence here at all.

  Act like a heroine, she told herself furiously. Ask the difficult questions, get him angry enough to reveal something. Make him lock you up in his dungeon, villains love to confess when they’ve got you under lock and key, and this one looks like he might be handy with the handcuffs.

  Mmm, handcuffs. Wait, where was I?

  This, of course, was assuming that Lord Sinistre actually was a villain. Was she prejudiced against him, because he wore black leather and made dramatic entrances? Kassa sighed.

  The next dish was presented by another effortlessly tactful manservant. It was a rose-shaped plate made from ice, a delicate sculpture scattered with tiny diamonds of sugar. In the centre of the outrageously elegant plate was a single, paper-thin slice of pear. Kassa peered at it in the dim candlelight, hoping to see a drizzle of chocolate or a rosette of cream to liven up the minuscule slice of fruit. There wasn’t any.

  “Ah, dessert,” said Lord Sinistre, his eyes gleaming.

  This was ridiculous. She had eaten exactly five and a half mouthfuls of food in the last three hours and they called this dessert? Hunger made Kassa irritable. She flashed her most seductive smile at Lord Sinistre, lifted her delicate flute of lemon-scented wine and clinked it against his.

  A second later, she dropped the glass.

  It looked like an accident, easy enough to do when distracted by an attractive man in a black leather suit. The crystal was so expensively fragile that it shattered on impact with the ice-plate, which also shattered.

  Kassa leaped back, but not before her skirt was soaked with pale wine, ice and glass shards. The slice of pear slid off the table and flopped along the balcony, leaping to freedom beyond the intricate moon-flower railings. She couldn’t blame it in the least.

  The tactful manservants were instantly there, three of them whisking cloths and brushes and fresh plates of dessert back and forth. The table was immaculate again within thirty seconds. A maid appeared, her gentle hand brushing against Kassa’s arm. Before Kassa realised what was happening, she was guided through the shimmering obsidian curtain, down the corridor and into a luscious wash chamber.

  When three more maids turned up with racks of fresh clothes for Kassa to try on, she rolled her eyes and pushed them all out into the corridor, protesting that she could towel her skirt dry without assistance. They obeyed without question.

  Kassa breathed, glad to be alone for a few seconds. She ran her thumb over the fabric of her skirt, murmuring an incantation and removing all traces of the wine. That done, she was free to examine the wash chamber at her leisure. The tiles, fittings and flickering candelabra were all black, with details and leaf-patterns picked out in gold. She had no doubt somehow that it was gold, not gilt.

  More importantly, the wash chamber had doors. Doors other than the door she had entered, which was guarded by the battalion of maids who waited to escort her back to Lord Sinistre and the pear slices.

  It would be easy to pretend she had walked through the wrong door by accident and found herself lost in a maze of unfamiliar corridors. With any luck, she would have time to have a good snoop round before one of them caught her.

  Kassa opened one of the doors and peered through. This looked promising.

  It was a gorgeous corridor, walled in red velvet curtains. Kassa practically drooled at the fabric — she had always wanted red velvet sails for her pirate ship! But that thought belonged to another life. She missed the Splashdance, with its flickering silver walls and cheerful crew. Well, not exactly cheerful. To be honest, most of them were miserable half the time, bitching about the dry rations or complaining that Kassa had turned one of them into a frog.

  Still, she had been happy. Captain of a ship, mistress of all she commanded, even a ragtag crew of reprobates and misfits. And traitors, she reminded herself. Don’t forget traitors.

  Kassa pushed open one door and stared at the largest swimming pool she had ever seen, a massive heart-shape glimmering in the moonlight, with dark scarlet tiles that made the water look like blood. She closed the door quickly, moving on down the corridor.

  Would they notice if half a hundred-weight of red velvet went mysteriously mis
sing? She was sure they wouldn’t go short, there must be an army of velvet makers in this city to supply the demand. The only problem was transporting it unseen back to her room in Cluft, but she was getting pretty good with the flying spells these days, and Singespitter might help out if she promised him a natty red velvet waistcoat in return…

  How did you make velvet anyway?

  Enough daydreaming, Kassa told herself sternly. Act like a heroine, damn it. You can’t go back to the kids and admit you didn’t find out a single clue about the damn city but you’re going steady with the Lordling!

  She opened another door. This was a cupboard filled with scrolls. Kassa unrolled one eagerly, but it was a supply list for the kitchens. Apparently they went through a lot of honey, saffron, lovage and smoked parrot livers on a weekly basis. Kassa didn’t bother looking at the other scrolls. Housekeeping bored her.

  She walked a little further down the velvet-lined corridor, opened a third door and gazed with sudden shock at Aragon Silversword.

  He sat at a gleaming mahogany desk, shuffling through papers. The walls were dark green and lined with shelves of book buckets. The moonlight shone through the window, illuminating his dark blond hair. He looked up and saw her.

  “Kassa.”

  The night before, he had seemed confused, as if he wasn’t sure whom she was or even whom he was. Not this time. He leaped up, slamming his hands against the polished desk, scattering papers everywhere. His grey eyes bored into her.

  “Kassa, we have to talk!”

  She ran. There was no excuse, except wanting very much not to hear the answers to her many questions. She fled down the corridor of red velvet, spun around a corner, found a door and threw herself through it, slamming the door behind her.

  Kassa closed her eyes, leaning against the door and breathing. There was no other sound. Was he looking for her? Was he even bothering?

  A quiet swishing sound alerted her to the fact that she was not the only presence in the room. Kassa opened her eyes.

  It was a perfectly ordinary room. Ordinary for Drak. Gold wallpaper, blood-red furniture, a few portraits of grim-looking lords and ladies, a fireplace that looked as if it had never been used, a spiralling vortex of darkness where a window should be…

  Kassa stared into the depths of the vortex. She could see light within its darkness, shimmering colours that she could neither name nor recognise. They whirled invitingly at her. She felt a seductive pull that urged her to step a little closer, let herself be swallowed whole by the spinning, sucking force of shadow. She could even hear something like a voice in her mind. Step inside, feel our power, taste the light and darkness of the universe…

  Kassa Daggersharp had never wanted anything so much as she now wanted to step inside that spiralling vortex and lose her mind and body within its dark layers.

  Needless to say, she kept her distance.

  ***

  Dahla was weeping. Her tangled, coppery hair was a mess around her face and shoulders. The tears fell fast and hard as she sobbed, her body crumpling up on the floor as if she had been given the worst news of her lifetime. She looked human, and broken.

  “I still don’t see her,” said Clio, as if she thought he was making it up.

  “Where is she?” asked Sean, waving his hand dangerously near Dahla’s head.

  Egg reached out and stopped him. “Don’t do that. You might hurt her.”

  “That’s right, McHagrty,” said Clio. “Mustn’t hurt Egg’s imaginary friend.”

  “She’s crying,” said Egg furiously, trying to comfort Dahla. “You’re upsetting her.”

  Dahla’s tears spilled down, splashing on to Egg’s outstretched hand. They looked so real. How could she be a ghost?

  “Oh gods,” said Sean, staring down at Egg’s hand. “Tell me that’s you sweating really hard.”

  Egg thrust out his hand. “You can see them? These are her tears. Taste them and see.”

  Sean stepped back quickly. “No thanks!”

  Clio sat up, looking strangely at them both. “I will,” she said.

  Egg stretched out his hand, holding it steady. Whole tears still glistened on his skin. “Can you see them?”

  “I don’t see anything,” said Clio. She ran her finger along the back of his hand and put it in her mouth. Her eyes widened. “Those are tears!” She looked closely at his eyes. “Not yours.”

  “Hers,” said Egg, indicating Dahla.

  Clio knelt down, gazing at the empty space. “I’m sorry if I upset you,” she whispered.

  Dahla stopped crying and looked at Clio. She pushed her tangled coppery hair back out of her wet face, her eyes fixed on the other girl.

  “It wasn’t you,” said Egg. “At least, not just you. Maybe it’s because you couldn’t see her. No one would enjoy being invisible.”

  “Then it’s my fault, too,” said Sean, crouching beside Clio. “Sorry, babe,” he added to the invisible presence of Dahla.

  Dahla did not even seem to register Sean’s presence. It was Clio she was fascinated with.

  “What’s her name?” Clio asked.

  The door banged open, revealing Kassa Daggersharp in all her Drak-inspired black and scarlet finery. “You will not believe the evening I have had!” she announced. Singespitter landed on the window sill and spat a fat scroll of parchment on to the carpet.

  Clio looked quickly at Egg. “She’s gone,” he told her. “I think loud noises startle her.” He wiped the last trace of Dahla’s tears on his trousers and looked up at Kassa. “What’s the news on Drak?”

  Kassa flopped on Egg’s bed. “The news is, we’re in trouble. Why are you all sitting on the floor?”

  Chapter 7 — Cloak and Dagger

  “The first thing to worry about,” said Kassa, “is that the draklight is spreading. When did this happen in those stories of yours, Egg, and what can we do to stop it?”

  “It didn’t,” said Egg. “I didn’t! There wasn’t any draklight in my stories, there was hardly any magic at all.” He hesitated. “Well, there were demons doing everything, and since there weren’t any farms I suppose there must have been magic to produce food and so on, but I never really mentioned it. There wasn’t magic spreading all over, making people dark and mysterious. There was nowhere for it to spread.”

  Kassa frowned. “Why not? Where was Drak, in your stories?”

  Egg shrugged. “Just in a wasteland, really. The city was cut off from everywhere else by this desolate wasteland of grit and rock and…”

  “Sand?” Kassa suggested. She stuck out her boots. Fine flecks of silvery sand were encrusted around her heels. “On my way home, I started wondering why we crossed to Drak by the skybridge when we could just as easily walk there from here. So I walked back at ground level. This stuff—” she picked at the silvery grains, “—is everywhere outside the paving stones of Drak, until the draklight ends and the green grass starts up again.”

  “That’s worrying,” said Clio.

  “It’s bloody frightening,” said Kassa. “Drak is attempting to recreate its natural environment. At this rate, the draklight could reach Cluft in less than a week. Within a month or two, Mocklore may no longer exist. We’ll all be living in … Drakland.” She sighed. “Why a wasteland, Egg? Why not rolling meadows and verdant fields?”

  Egg didn’t say anything.

  “So what did you discover in the city itself?” Clio asked Kassa.

  “Nothing entirely useful,” Kassa admitted. “Lord Sinistre’s idea of an intimate supper wouldn’t keep a gnat alive, they have more red velvet than any one city strictly needs, and their candles don’t work very well. Oh, and it’s always a full moon over there.”

  “That’s impossible,” said Sean. “Isn’t it? Why would they have a full moon over there when we have an ordinary moon over here?”

  Everyone looked at Egg.

  “It’s easier to draw,” he said, staring at his feet.

  “What a fascinating new world we’re going to find ourselves
in.” sighed Kassa.

  Singespitter snorted loudly, tapping the large scroll he had brought with him.

  “I see your snooping produced more tangible results than mine,” said Kassa. “Anything good?” She reached for the scroll, unrolling it.

  A movement caught Egg’s eye, and he looked at the window. “The Cloak!”

  Kassa whirled towards the window. “What? Where? Was he that pompous costumed one who vanquished the musician demons?”

  “Um, yes, him. He was at the window just now,” said Egg. I think he was listening to us.”

  “Interesting.” Kassa went to the window, flung it open and climbed out. “I want a word with this Cloak person.”

  “She does realise this is three floors up, doesn’t she?” said Sean.

  By the time the three of them reached the window, Kassa was clambering down the face of the building with apparent ease, her skirts hitched up around her waist. “What should I know this bloke?” she called up to Egg.

  “I told you, he’s the Cloak,” he yelled down. “Bringer of order to chaos, maker of justice for all!”

  Kassa landed neatly on the ground. “No, I mean who is he under that cloak of his? What sort of person?”

  Egg hesitated. “I hadn’t worked that out yet!”

  “Oh, fine,” Kassa muttered. “You’d think if the powers that be wanted a fictional city brought to life, they’d find one that was finished!” She ran off across the courtyard, in the direction of Drak.

  Clio reached out and slammed the window closed, almost catching Egg’s knuckles. He drew his hands back quickly. “What’s your problem?”

  “You were lying,” she snapped. “You just lied to her, Egg. I don’t believe you haven’t figured out every single detail about those heroes of yours. You keep telling us that it wasn’t the city you were interested in, it was the characters. So what are you hiding about this particular character?”

  ***

  The cloaked figure ran over the skybridge. Kassa thought she was being clever to take the other route, running hard across the grass in an attempt to get to Drak before he did. It meant taking a detour to hop over the canals, but she was still gaining on him. As she passed into the draklight, her mind came alive with dark impulses and morbid thoughts. Sand crunched under her boots, and although she felt strong enough to run forever, the sand slowed her down.