Soleil

by Jacqueline Garlick

  “‘Ow do yah think all this ‘as ‘appened?” Pitchfork man carries on. “I’ll tell you ‘ow.” He paces, pitchfork raised. “We’s got ourselves a new Ruler, who’s brought it all upon us!”

  “That’s not true!” Masheck shouts.

  I’ve the urge to jump up and give my two pence, but I know it’ll only make things worse.

  “I say we lynch ‘im,” pitchfork man shouts.

  “Storm the castle and drag ‘im out!”

  “I say we hang him and dip him in the square.”

  “Stop this talk. All of you!” Parthena turns on them. “What’s happening has nothing to do with Urlick!”

  “Explain it to us, then,” a young woman snaps. “Who’s the cause of it, if ‘e isn’t?” She squirrels an eye and spreads out her arms, her fingers, hunchin’ her shoulders as if to conduct Wickedry ‘erself. “If not born out of witchcraft, then what is it?”

  The crowd goes wild. They look terrified. There’s no containin’ ‘em. They shout and ‘oller, cursing Urlick’s name. Women fall to their knees in cleansin’ prayer.

  “Stop, you must stop!” Parthena shouts, wavin’ ‘er arms up and down. “He is not the evil you think he is!”

  “Then what evil is ‘e?” a woman clutches her crucifix. “What evil has caused all of this?”

  Others follow suit, bowin’ their ‘eads and mutterin’ chants. Cleansin’ chants, performed at dippings. Their voices monotone. They demand to have Urlick ‘ung.

  “What’s going on ‘ere?” Masheck turns to Parthena, his eyes as round as wheels.

  “They’re clearing the air of spirits.”

  “Their demandin’ that ‘e be put to death,” I add.

  Masheck’s pupils flash.

  “As soon as he arrived, the trouble started,” the woman cries, her words mingling with the punched up wind. It blusters through the crowd, and the women scream.

  “There’ve been storms and winds and a trace of Vapours. I’ve tasted them on me own tongue!” the woman screams.

  The crowd howls again. One woman faints.

  Parthena leans out. “Please! Please! None of this is true!”

  “Are you saying we’re not in any danger?” the man with the pitchfork shouts.

  The crowd falls into a hush. They turn to Masheck, wind rakin’ through their ‘air.

  Masheck hesitates. “No,” he says. “You are in danger. That’s what I’m here to say.”

  “You see!”

  “Silence!” Masheck shouts over ‘em. He struts to the front of the stage. “I’ve been sent here to warn you of the danger—to warn you all to take cover—and to offer you safe harbour to weather out the storm. To save you all from it. But it appears you aren’t willin’ to listen.”

  Several people lower their ‘eads.

  “I can tell you this,” he shouts, “the worst is yet to come!”

  The crowd falls silent.

  He broadens his stance and stares out over top of them. “I’ll ‘ave you know, I stand here on behalf of your Ruler, who has gone to the very brink of Embers to find out what ‘as gone wrong. He is out there”—Masheck points—“prepared to give his life for yours, while you stand ‘ere and call ‘im a madman.” He turns his eyes on the noisy woman, and then stares the pitchfork man down. “This ruler you speak of lynchin’.”

  The crowd becomes breathlessly silent. They gawk and stare at one another.

  The man with the pitchfork stands down.

  “In the meantime, he’s left me in charge,” Masheck shouts. “And my instructions are to tell you all to take shelter in one of the following locations.” He unfurls a paper shakily and reads from it. “In the underground bunker in the centre of Market Square, or the one on the hill under the Academy. Any overflow can report to the Palace; we have bunkers there, too.” Masheck speeds up, the winds increasing, rolling in through the trees. “Know that the only truth spoken here today is that there are Vapours within our air,” he hollers, raising his arms. “If you value your life, you will take cover from them as I directed, at one of the designated places, until they clear. If you choose not to take shelter, it is on you, not your Ruler!”

  “Masheck?” Parthena teeters back, aghast.

  Another gust of wind slams our backs.

  “Now, go,” Masheck cries. “Before the winds worsen!”

  People shout and scream and stir. Some turn and ‘ead for the exits. The wind whips the clothin’ in circles.

  Masheck turns and trundles down the stage steps.

  “Wait!” Parthena grabs ‘is arm, ‘er gaze pulsing fear. “What if they don’t do as you say? What then?”

  Masheck glances at me then back at her. “It is as I said.” He pulls ‘is arm back, but Parthena yanks ‘im back.

  “But they’ll perish! The people will perish!”

  He whirls around. “And so will Eyelet and Urlick if I don’t go after them. I’ve done all I can. So now, if you’d please…” ‘E stares down at ‘er ‘and.

  She lets go, an’ ‘e whirls around and stalks away.

  “Wait!” I charge after ‘im. “You’re not goin’ without me!”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Eyelet

  The weather inside the capsule rages, growing even more violent than before. The wind within pounds the sides with increasing fury as Sir Hatter works a panel of levers in front of him, like a conductor would a symphony.

  My eyes settle on a familiar gauge. One thousand seventy-six parts per million, and climbing.

  “It was you,” I whisper, gasping. “It’s been you all along. It’s always been you. Controlling the storms. Creating the frenzy. You’re the reason the Vapours are out of control.”

  “Bravo, my little friend.” The Hatter narrows his eyes. He yanks the levers back, causing the storm to jump and flare before turning back again.

  “How could you? What have you done?”

  Sir Hatter smirks and draws back a silver lever. The storm inside the glass tank rises up into a curl. “It isn’t what I’ve done. It’s what your father did. I’ve just been playing around with his legacy. He was the one who invented this wickedness. All I’ve done is harness it.”

  “You lie. My father had nothing to do with this.”

  “You father gave birth to the Vapours. The founding father of atomic # 88.”

  “No.” I shake my head. “No, it can’t be true.” Atomic # 88, on the element table. The pages. The warning. Eight, eight, eight, eight, eight.

  “It was he who unleashed the radium poison, that’s destroyed our world as we know it.”

  “The Vapours—”

  “Yes, are made of pure radiation. The very thing that has forever changed our world. The ultimate power has been released. There’s no retracting it now.”

  “It was you...the notes were you…all of this, was you…”

  “Though, in all fairness, it wasn’t completely all your father’s fault. His father had something to do with it too.” He scorches Urlick with a look.

  “He did not,” Urlick shouts.

  “Oh, really? Was it someone else who pushed that button?” He breaks out into laughter.

  “Yet, you tried to do it again?” I say. “Tried to recreate the moment, with us at the Core—”

  “The initial damage was already done.”

  “And you intended to do more. Just as you do now, with that capsule.”

  “At the time, I was after something else. Far more important than the end of the world.”

  “And what was that?”

  “The passageway to a better world. The utopia beyond the clouds.” He narrows his eyes. “Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking. I know you saw it, just as I did. But neither of us will ever get there now.”

  Urlick’s head swings to me. “What is he talking about?”

  Sir Hatter grins. “Madness, mostly. I’ve injected this storm with extra poison from all the storms before. When I let it loose, everyone will be dead. No one will be making
it to the Promised Land. Not you, not me, not that little wench Penelope. She will not fly my airship creation to Limpidious without me!”

  “What?” Urlick’s mouth parts.

  I turn cold eyes on Smrt. “You believed in Limpidious, yet you persecuted my father for exactly the same thing?”

  “Of course I did.” He turns on me. “I was the one who found the books first. I was the one who told him of the legend.”

  “What books?” Urlick says.

  “The gospels by Joseph Faraday,” Smrt says.

  Urlick scowls. “The Chronicles of Hannibal Atticus.”

  “Yes. You know of them?” Smrt arches his brows.

  “They’re nothing but fairy tales. Three-hundred-year-old fairy tales.”

  “They are not fairy-tales.” Smrt seethes.

  “They are so.”

  “Urlick, don’t, please.” I grab his arm.

  “There is no such thing as a float world devoid of pain and suffering,” Urlick shouts.

  “Shut up and play the game!” The Hatter pulls up a whip and strikes the back of the Queen, jolting him into pedaling faster. “If you win, you take the necklace. If you lose, you save the world.” He yanks back on the levers, and the storm thrusts against the glass, snarling and snapping like a hellhound. “When I count to three, you’ll make a choice.”

  The tray spins ever faster.

  His voice sounds like a snake charmer’s. “Choose the red tea, and you’ll get whatever your heart desires. Choose the blue tea, and you won’t, but…the one you love most in the world will get their heart’s desire. The choice is yours.”

  “But which is the right one?” Flossie shouts.

  “Choose!” Sir Hatter shouts.

  Purple plumes of steam rise up from the cups, confusing us. It’s hard to see either the red or blue tea. It’s all a blur.

  “Choose, and drink!”

  I stare down the spinning tray, the teas warping in and out of view. Red then blue, then blue in the red. I can’t tell one from the other. A flash of my greatest desire lights behind my swimming eyes. My father, mother, back together. I’m a small child. The Illuminator’s green buzzing ray lifts the callous from my brain so I am no longer defective. A red light, flashes within the scene.

  I hear Sir Hatter voice shouting out. There’s a ticking clock, and a bell is about to ring.

  I reach out, hand hovering over the choices of tea, the colours blurred. I try to figure out the pattern. Red. Blue. Blue. Red. Red. Blue.

  But there is none.

  They’re spinning. Sloshing and spinning. Steam rising. There won’t be any left to drink.

  Sir Hatter’s singing, demonically. Beside him, the Queen cackles, pedalling as fast as he can. Sparks fly. A blade zings. The Black Queen grinds his axe to a finer edge on the fender.

  I must select. I have to choose.

  “I can’t!” I shout. “I can’t!”

  “Pick one!” Urlick shouts. “You’re almost out of time!”

  I stare hard at the swirling silver tray, trying to decipher which is which, then reach in and snag a cup.

  “Drink!” the Hatter shouts.

  I gulp the potion down.

  Urlick does the same, as does Flossie, though it’s hard to tell who is who, or what is what, with all the whirling and twirling about. Writhing purple steam twists about our heads. All at once the whirring stops. The tray stops spinning. All that’s left is the isolated sound of the Mad Hatter’s chanting, and the fading cackle of the Queen’s laugh.

  I grab the edges of the table in an attempt to steady myself, as the blurring world slows down. The air in the room fills with the sound of silence. As at last the room comes to a swift, vomit-inducing stop.

  “Well, well, well…” Sir Hatter says, as my stomach feels flips, my inners cascading upside down. A slight throb in my head pounds. I reach up to end it. “What have we here,” Sir Hatter finishes his sinewy sentence.

  I look around. Urlick’s complexion whiter than usual, and his lips are a darker purple-blue. The edges of them are dashed in what appears to be dark ink.

  He must have chosen blue.

  I reach up, swiping my own mouth, praying I’ve done the same, and smile when I see the result. I look up from my inky-stained fingers. Urlick and I exchange grins.

  I look to examine Flossie’s choice, a dead giveaway. Her bright red lips are tightly pursed. “Wha-aht?” she says, as if she’s been caught doing something wrong.

  Sir Hatter breaks into an evil laugh.

  “What? What is it?” Flossie panics, wiping her mouth. She stares down at her hand and back up at me, as I were the one who made the choice for her. “What is it? What’s the matter?”

  “You lose,” the Hatter says.

  “I what?” She gulps. “But how can that be I?” she squeals. “I chose the red one. See.” She shows her father her hand. “My heart’s desire fulfilled.”

  “Precisely.” He sits back. “The selfish choice.”

  “The What?”

  Sir Hatter extends his arms, palms cupped flat out like a pair of balancing scales. He tips them up and down, as he chants, “Selfless. Selfish. Selfless. Selfish.” He rocks in his seat. “Surely, you must see the error of your ways now.” Sir Hatter grins. “I’m afraid you’ve simply made the wrong choice, my child. A fatal one.”

  “A what?” Flossie gasps and gawks our way. “But, you never said—” Her head twist round. “How can it be wrong? That doesn’t’ make sense.”

  “That’s the beauty of it”—Sir Hatter cackles and claps his hands—“it doesn’t have to! Hah, ha, ha, ha, ha, haaaah!” He wickedly laughs. He raises his hand in a small wave. “Bye, bye.”

  “What?”

  A pair of trapdoors open behind Flossie’s head crank open. A giant hose, like a vacuum’s slithers out. Opening wide, like the mouth of a snake, it hovers noisily above her head, drawing her hair up out of its sweep. “I was going to share the elixir, and then I thought, no. Why should I? I mean, seriously, you’ve never meant all that much to me,” Sir Hatter shouts above the roar of the machine.

  “But—”

  Flossie scarcely has the time to let out a scream before she sucked out of the ropes of her chair and up through the hose and out of the room. The power of the gust tears the skin off her flesh, and parts her flesh from her bones—grinding the last into dust.

  I throw my hands to my ears to block out the sound, and turn my face away, as what’s left of Flossie shoots up through the hose, into a transparent tube, and is dumped into the capsule behind us. Sir Hatter’s and the Queen’s laughter riffles about the room as she’s spat out as particles into the roiling, blackening storm.

  The device that destroyed her quickly retracts back into the wall. The trapdoors snap shut. Urlick and I sit breathless and shaking. I look behind our heads, searching for doors of the same, as the Hatter dusts off his hands and draws in a contented sigh. “Now, where were we?” He stares hard at me. “Oh, yes, the choices.” He tweaks his moustache. “Well, would you look at that?” He smirks and stretches across the table like sun-cooked worm. “It appears you’ve won the game.” I heave in a breath “But lost the fortune, in a matter of speaking.” He turns to the Queen and they share a hearty laugh. “A kingdom for a necklace. Seems fair, wouldn’t you say?”

  The Queen vigorously nods, and my brain swirls, confused.

  I spy the necklace sitting on the table. My mind races with ideas how to grab it. But even if I were successful in snagging the necklace, how do we stop him from implementing his plan?

  “I suppose if I was fair, I’d hand you this, and you’d be gone.” Sir Hatter leans back. He nonchalantly checks his nailbeds. “But then again, when have I ever been known to be fair?” He laughs again. The Queen laughs with him. This laughter worming like poison through my ears.

  “Get ready,” Urlick whispers.

  “What?” I turn my head. I track Urlick’s gaze to the necklace on the table.

  Sir Hatt
er stands up with a jolt, slamming down a hand, capturing the necklace beneath it. “You still think you can win against me?” His voice booms, bouncing off the walls in the room.

  With a flick of his wrist, Urlick launches Sir Hatter’s spoon up off the table and catches it mid-air, then hurls it across the room, sticking it in the spokes of the Queen’s cycle, stopping the dance of the Vapours, momentarily. The capsule calms. Sir Hatter swears, then shouts and grits his teeth. “Cease them!” he shouts at the Queen.

  Urlick lurches forward, slamming his fist down on the panel of buttons next to Sir Hatter’s plate. He deploys a button and the back doors to the room swing open. “Run!” he shouts at me. Scooping up a cup from the steaming tray, he then flings the contents in Sir Hatter’s face.

  At the same time, I lunge for the necklace, the Queen catching me hard about the waist. His steely forearm crushes me. I fight and kick as he draws me in.

  “Urlick!” I scream, as the blade of his axe is again at my throat.

  “No!” Urlick shouts, lunging forward. “No. Stop. Don’t!”

  Urlick raises his hands in surrender. “I lied,” he shouts, turning to Smrt’s. “I lied about everything. Flossie was right.”

  “What are you doing?” I yell at him.

  “Shut up!” Sir Hatter barks. His head twists between the Queen and Urlick. “Go on…”

  I shake my head.

  “I do possess a magic serum.” He reaches for his pocket. “I—”

  “Urlick, please!” I don’t know what he’s talking about, what he thinks he’s doing...

  “I’ll give it to you, in exchange for Eyelet.” He pulls out a small leather pouch, bound by a leather strap. He waves it in the air for Smrt to see. Something doesn’t feel right. “I’ll give it to you, if you give me her. And let us go on our way, unharmed.”

  Smrt narrows his eyes and glares at the pouch. “And how do I know it’s real? How do I know it’s not some sort of trick?”

  “Because.” Urlick inches closer. “The Alchemist gave it to me.”

  “Why? Why would the Alchemist give over his secret powers?”

  “Because he knew I’d need them. Now, here, take it.” Urlick shakes the pouch toward him in his hand. “Release Eyelet and take it.”