‘You don’t know that,’ said Seth defensively.
Viola tutted. ‘Another Queen-lover.’ She gave a long sigh. ‘And I had such high hopes for you.’
She punched him in the arm and ran off ahead, smiling mischievously. Seth rubbed his arm, but was smiling too. Ellie felt a hot twinge in her chest.
‘Seth, listen,’ she said, partly to get his attention back. ‘I found something out about the Queen, actually. She’s not a god. She’s a Vessel.’
Seth gave her a long stare.
‘Apparently there have been other Queens and Kings before her,’ Ellie continued. ‘But they must have contained the same god, passing from one person to the next. Another Vessel, Seth! Like me!’
Seth frowned, but stayed silent.
‘What?’ said Ellie. She searched his face, but his eyes were far away, like he was doing complex sums in his head. ‘Why aren’t you excited?’
‘She’s not like you. She’s a Queen.’
‘But she has a god inside her – one of your siblings.’
‘Ellie, the only one of my siblings we’ve met keeps trying to kill you. Maybe Viola’s right not to trust the Queen.’
‘But that’s the other thing,’ she said. ‘The Enemy’s afraid of her. She’s the most powerful person on this island! In the whole world, maybe! What if she can help us?’
Seth looked at her with a mixture of pity and affection. ‘Ellie, you don’t know anything about her. What do you expect her to do if you turn up and say, “Hi, I’m a Vessel too, and, by the way, my friend here is a god”?’
‘Well, obviously I’m not going to say that,’ said Ellie.
‘Powerful people are dangerous, Ellie,’ said Seth. ‘Have you forgotten the Inquisition?’
Ellie crossed her arms. ‘Just because she’s a Vessel doesn’t mean she’s dangerous. Besides, you’re powerful. And you’re not dangerous.’
Seth gave her another long stare. ‘We shouldn’t draw attention to ourselves. We need to be careful, in case the person on that ship really did follow us here.’
Ellie shrugged. ‘If they did, they should watch themselves – apparently, people from the City have been executed here before.’
Seth’s eyes bulged. ‘Then we definitely need to be careful.’
‘We’re here!’ Viola announced.
They’d come out of the street, and were standing directly in the shadow of the Ark’s belly. The island was almost vertical on this side, a sheer hill rising towards the bottom of the Ark, cluttered with colourful, cosily packed houses.
‘This part of the island is called the Shambles,’ Viola said fondly. Ellie thought this a very appropriate name. It was a wall of tiered streets, homes piled on top of each other like ill-fitting jigsaw pieces, stacked so steeply that anyone racing out of their front door would likely tumble to their death.
They climbed tight little staircases, chickens strutting across the drystone walls, pecking up tiny, jewel-coloured insects. There were no palm trees here but thick, fierce oaks, which looked considerably older than anything else on the island, except maybe the Ark itself. One unfortunate building had a tree growing all the way through it, though it might have been more accurate to say the tree had bits of building growing round it. It was a particularly burly and menacing oak, clutching fragments of the building in its branches, like a child that has broken its favourite toy. The largest part of the building was at street level, wedged into the trunk, from which many staircases wound out of and up the tree’s sides, following the branches to where other ramshackle huts sat like birds’ nests.
A metal sign dangled from one branch. THE — OAK, it read, the middle word obscured by rust.
‘The Vile Oak!’ said Viola proudly.
‘That’s not a good name for an inn,’ said Seth.
‘Its real name is the Royal Oak, but no one calls it that except Molworth the innkeeper. He gets really angry when you don’t use its proper name.’
Bells tinkled as they opened the front door, into a wide room that smelled of stale beer and oranges. In places, the walls had been ripped open by the tree, branches pressing in to fill the gaps. Behind a polished bar stood a small boy, his pale round face only just peeping above the counter.
‘It’s … nice,’ said Ellie. ‘Where’s the innkeeper?’
Viola frowned. ‘There.’
‘Where?’
‘Here,’ said the boy. He raised himself up on to the bar, glaring at them with eyes like deep puddles. He had wispy black hair, a single curl plastered to his pale forehead. He wore a black jacket with silver buttons, which looked expensive, and a pair of ragged trousers, which did not.
‘This is Molworth,’ said Viola. ‘He owns the inn.’
‘How old are you?’ asked Ellie.
‘Twelve,’ said Molworth. His voice was surprisingly deep. ‘How old are you?’
‘Thirteen. What’s a twelve-year-old doing owning an inn?’
‘What’s a thirteen-year-old doing asking stupid questions? And why aren’t either of you wearing shoes? Viola, why’ve you brought me an idiot and a mute with no shoes? Also, didn’t I bar you?’
‘I’m not mute,’ Seth muttered.
‘I won the inn,’ said Molworth, crossing his arms. ‘In a game of cards.’
Viola rolled her eyes. ‘You did not. Your dad left it to you in his will.’
‘Only because I beat him in a game of cards. Now, if you can’t afford shoes, I doubt you can afford rooms, either. And I don’t sell beer to children.’ He paused. ‘Not any more.’
‘My dad’s just given the healthy one a job,’ said Viola, jangling Janssen’s purse. ‘They can afford one of the top rooms.’
‘Healthy one?’ said Ellie.
Molworth let out a long groan. ‘Fine.’ He bowed. ‘Let me fetch the key, and I’ll lead you to your room, loyal subjects.’
He flopped gracelessly from view. Behind the bar, Ellie noticed, was another tall statue of the Queen – the most intricate and well crafted she’d seen. Other queenly statuettes sat in cubbyholes round the walls, between dusty bottles, and pinned to the shelves were dozens of drawings of a beautiful face with yellow eyes and purple hair. Scribbled in the corner of one were the words Molworth, aged nine and a half.
‘You really like the Queen,’ said Seth.
Molworth’s head reappeared, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. ‘Who doesn’t?’
‘Me,’ said Viola.
‘And that’s why I barred you!’ Molworth snapped. ‘Only a fool like Viola wouldn’t love the Queen – She is our beloved provider and protector.’ He climbed on the counter and threw his hands above his head, reminding Ellie of the preachers back in the City. ‘She is the Vessel!’ he proclaimed. ‘The physical container of our kind and benevolent God, who brings the harvest and the fish! She is the watcher of the horizon and the source of life itself, and we are not worthy of Her grace! She is divine and beautiful and in six weeks She will return the island to greatness at the Festival of Life!’
‘Please shut up, Molworth,’ said Viola.
Molworth glared at her balefully. ‘I will not,’ he said. ‘And another thing: stop leaving those leaflets of yours on my tables. Nobody cares about your stupid Revolution. You’re an ungrateful heathen and one day I’m going to take that cat and –’
Viola rushed over and tickled him under the arms.
‘No, don’t!’ Molworth protested, laughing hysterically.
‘There are other things in life besides the Queen, you know,’ Viola said, grabbing the key from Molworth’s fist and leading Seth and Ellie away from the bar, leaving Molworth crumpled against the counter.
‘Nothing worth my time,’ he said, in a faraway voice.
Ellie and Seth followed Viola up a narrow winding staircase high into the oak, its leaves shimmering around them, to a branch that was as thick as a whale, sanded flat to accommodate a long wooden hut. Inside was a humid corridor.
‘You’re down the far end,’ said Viola, handin
g Seth the key. ‘I better get back to Dad. See you tomorrow, Seth. Be at the docks by dawn – we sail with the tide! Oh and I’ll bring some of my leaflets for you to read. Bye, Jennifer,’ she added to Ellie.
The room looked like a ship’s cabin, smelling of pine and tobacco, the ceiling so low that Seth had to hunch. Ellie hung her coat on the single hook in the wall, which promptly fell off, clattering to the floor and taking her coat with it. A black liquid seeped from the pockets.
‘Ellie, try to keep this room clean, will you?’ Seth said.
‘That wasn’t my fault!’ she said, then noticed Seth was smiling.
‘And no experiments, either,’ he added archly.
Ellie huffed and inspected a crude painting of a horse on the shelf, the name Molworth scrawled in one corner. She picked up her coat and searched the pockets, removing a flat parcel of dried seal intestine, inside which was a water-damaged drawing of a boat in coloured pencils. On the boat was a girl with ginger hair, a girl with blonde hair, and a boy with green eyes. Ellie placed it on the shelf and nodded approvingly, until thoughts of Anna made her sad and she looked about for a distraction.
‘We have a door!’ she announced, grinning and pointing at the flimsy piece of wood, badly set into the wall.
‘And a window,’ Seth said, opening it and eliciting a disgruntled squawk from the seagull nesting outside. He leaned back on one of the two beds, his face bathed in warm honey-coloured daylight. ‘It’s weird that I get to live here and it doesn’t have to be a secret.’
Ellie smiled, delighted to see him happy.
She hobbled over to the other bed. It was child-sized, with a single pillow spilling feathers, and a metal frame crusted orange with rust. It was beautiful.
‘A bed,’ she said. ‘An actual bed. Isn’t it great, Seth? Seth?’
Seth’s eyes were closed and his mouth hung open. Ellie tucked the sheet round him, then yawned. Her bed drew her towards it like a current, her head hitting the pillow.
CRASH.
Ellie and Seth both jumped to their feet in terror.
Janssen stood in the doorway, a huge smile on his face, a frightening sparkle in his eye, and Molworth tucked under one arm. He pointed at Seth.
‘There he is! My saviour. Come, boy, we’re celebrating!’
‘Please let me go,’ said Molworth, his voice muffled by Janssen’s armpit.
‘They need sleep, Dad,’ said Viola, appearing from behind Janssen. ‘Look – they’re exhausted.’
But Janssen hoisted Seth up and jogged from the room, ferrying Seth and Molworth under each arm. The door slammed shut, and Ellie was alone.
The silence pressed in on her, shocking and sudden, like she’d only dreamed the others had just been there. She looked at Seth’s empty bed, frowned, then pulled on her coat and crept after them.
The bar felt half the size it had done before, crowded by singing and shouting and the smell of fish. Fifty men and women in jerkins and torn trousers were taking it in turns to introduce themselves to Seth. He kept running a hand through his hair and smiling bashfully, and sometimes he would say something and everyone would laugh. Ellie had never noticed how good Seth was with people before, although admittedly back in the City everyone had wanted to kill him. Even Anna.
Ellie’s heart ached at the thought of Anna threatening to slip poison in Seth’s breakfast. She stood alone in a corner, afraid someone would glance over and take note of her aloneness. She felt very aware of her hands, and didn’t know what to do with them; they seemed huge and conspicuous. She spotted Viola leaning against the bar, holding up a saucer of milk for Archibald to drink from.
‘Hello, I’m Ellie,’ she said, hurrying over.
Viola’s eyes narrowed in confusion. ‘I know. We … we’ve met.’
‘Oh, yes. I just … you know, in case you’d forgotten.’
Viola looked at Ellie, and Ellie swallowed, finding her head empty of thoughts. Anna had once told her that a good way to make friends was by telling jokes, or by finding something you had in common. But Ellie had never been good at jokes – she always overthought them. She scratched her head, opened her mouth, then closed it again. The lump in her throat swelled to the size of a cannonball.
‘So … do you like … fish?’
Viola frowned. ‘Here, have one of these,’ she said, offering Ellie a plate of round sugar-coated buns. ‘My mum used to make ’em. Dad’s never got the recipe right.’
Ellie took one gratefully. ‘So … why doesn’t your mum make them any more?’
‘She’s dead.’
‘Oh great!’
Viola’s eyes widened.
‘I mean.’ Ellie winced. ‘My mum’s dead too. So’s my brother,’ she added, as if this might somehow mean they had more in common.
Viola gave Ellie a long stare. ‘Wait, I thought Seth was your brother?’
‘Oh, oh right, yeah. He is my brother. My other brother. I have two brothers. I mean … I had two brothers. No, wait –’
Viola continued to stare.
‘Um, I should go and check Seth’s doing okay,’ Ellie said hurriedly.
But Seth was doing okay – much more than okay, even. The sailors clamoured round him, telling stories that involved a lot of dramatic hand gestures and booming laughter. Seth just listened quietly as they vied to impress him – somehow, they’d already accepted him as one of their own. Molworth, meanwhile, was darting around at waist height with a cloth and a look of panic, mopping spills and snatching up empty glasses before a careless hand could knock them flying.
‘Come on then, lad – what’s your secret?’ one man asked Seth.
‘Oh,’ said Seth, rubbing the back of his head, smiling that same bashful smile. ‘Well, you know. I just ask the fish really nicely.’
The roar of laughter was so loud Ellie had to cover her ears, while Molworth dropped a glass, miraculously catching it on the tip of his shoe. Ellie frowned – it wasn’t even a good joke! She wondered if being handsome meant people always laughed at your jokes, even if they weren’t funny.
Viola joined the circle. ‘Did you tell ’em about the great white shark we saw?’
‘Oh yeah,’ said Seth. ‘It was massive. Its teeth were like carving knives and it came right up next to the boat.’
Ellie felt another hot stab in her chest. Why had Seth not mentioned to her that they’d seen a great white shark?
‘Seth threw a fish straight in its mouth,’ said Viola, miming the action. ‘Thought it was going to take his arm off – you could see right down its big throat.’
The crowd listened intently, and the way Seth and Viola spoke it was like they were the only two people in the bar.
‘How long do you think it was?’ said Seth. ‘The length of this room?’
‘And it had these dead lifeless eyes,’ said Viola. ‘Almost jumped in the water just to see what it would do. Always fancied myself a shark wrestler. What I’d do is, I’d punch it right in the head, then –’
‘I saw a great white shark once,’ said Ellie.
Viola blinked at the interruption. ‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah,’ said Ellie. All the sailors turned to stare at her. She cleared her throat. ‘It was dead.’
‘Oh,’ said Viola, her smile faltering. Seth scratched his head. The other sailors muttered to one another.
‘Yeah,’ said Ellie. Her throat seemed to be closing up. ‘It smelled bad too.’
There was a moment’s silence, and if there’d been a great white shark in the bar, Ellie would have leapt straight into its mouth.
‘Excuse me,’ she said, and hobbled for the front door. ‘I, uh … need to check on a … tree.’ She fumbled with the door handle. ‘It’s outside.’
‘Your sister’s an odd one, isn’t she?’ Janssen said. The door closed behind her, drowning out the sound of their laughter. Ellie stepped into the baking daylight, looking down at the sea and the huge new island around her.
And somewhere, deep inside her mind, crawling from on
e slimy, secret corner, she heard something else laughing.
The Spy
Ellie didn’t know where she was going, she just knew she didn’t want to be at the inn. She took the first alley she could find, away from the Shambles and towards the rest of the island.
‘You’ll be much too hot in that coat, girl,’ said a man on a pile of straw, a cat nestled in his lap.
Ellie scowled and pulled her coat tightly round herself stubbornly. She realized suddenly but with complete clarity that she hated this island, with its stifling heat that made sweat get in her eyes, and its people who crowded round Seth adoringly while ignoring her altogether.
It was a few streets before she realized her feet were taking her upward, towards the island’s peak. Towards the Ark. She stopped, and was annoyed to find a tear on her cheek. She looked up at the Ark, its prow stabbing the sky. Surely, if anyone on this island was going to understand her, it would be a Queen. A Queen who was wise, and wanted to protect her people. A Queen who was a Vessel.
Ellie hurried onwards, not caring that her leg hurt. Performers capered atop tall stilts, covered in shimmering purple feathers, tottering around to the delight of small children. She passed what looked like guards, or soldiers maybe – men and women in polished silver armour and ornate conical helmets, with plumes of feathers issuing from the top, a deep onion red. Always she watched the alleyways, searching for the tall figure from the beach.
She was pretty sure she’d come to the richer part of the island. The buildings up here were less ramshackle, though just as colourful, and the people would have shamed even the whale lords with their extravagance. They were clothed in dresses shaped like church bells, the colours of saffron and wheat, turtle green and parrot turquoise. They wore huge, gem-studded hats, which looked likely to cause neck problems in later life.
Strangely, Ellie couldn’t always see the Ark this far up the island, what with the streets being packed so high. She caught glimpses of it between rooftops as she passed by, but only after climbing for what felt an hour, as she turned on to a long, broad street, was it revealed entirely.
Shipwreck Island Page 4