by Paul Stewart
‘Get off me!’ Skillix said, twisting round and swatting the young sub-apprentice away like a bug.
‘You must let me have it,’ Runnet persisted. ‘You must …’ He dragged a pouch from his pocket and jangled it loudly. ‘Thirty-eight gold pieces there are here,’ he said, ‘and I can get you the rest next week.’
‘The rest?’ said Skillix.
‘The other twelve gold pieces,’ said Runnet. ‘I'll…’
‘Call it twenty and I might be interested,’ Skillix interrupted.
Runnet's jaw dropped. ‘Twenty?’ he said. ‘But you said … I can't … It's too much…’
‘As you please,’ said Skillix, and turned away again.
This time Runnet did not try to stop him. His eagerness to buy had alerted Skillix to the value of the paper he was trying to sell. They both knew that there were several apprentices in the School of Mist – apprentices with far more generous fathers – who would pay twice as much for the question paper once word got round that it was available. And, Runnet thought bitterly, word would get round.
‘Oh, Gloamglozer,’ he muttered miserably, and held his head in his hands. ‘What in Sky's name am I going to do now?’
‘So far as I can see, you have two choices,’ came a deep, throaty voice from behind him.
He looked round to see a tall individual standing in front of him. He was dressed in ill-fitting academic's robes. A silver nose-piece could be seen glinting from within the folds of his baggy hood.
‘Are you talking to me?’ asked Runnet.
The academic glanced quickly over both shoulders, then nodded. ‘I am,’ he confirmed gruffly. ‘I couldn't help overhearing all about your little … difficulty,’ he said, ‘and … that is … I am in a position to help you out.’
‘You are?’ said Runnet suspiciously. No-one did anything for anyone in Sanctaphrax without seeking something in return. He looked the academic up and down but, thanks to the false nose, was unable to place him, although there was something faintly familiar about the smell of tallow and woodcamphor coming from his robes.
‘You are interested in the Mistsifting examination, are you not?’ he said.
Runnet nodded. ‘The final one,’ he said.
‘The very same,’ said the academic, patting a pocket at his side.
Runnet gasped. ‘You've got a copy of the question paper?’ he said.
‘Better than that,’ said the academic. ‘I've got the answers.’
Runnet was speechless. The answers! If he hadn't been able to afford the questions, then he certainly wouldn't have enough to buy the answers. If only he could … He looked up at the academic. ‘H … how much are you asking for them?’ he said, nervous of the answer.
‘Thirty-eight gold pieces,’ came the reply.
‘Thirty-eight?’ said Runnet excitedly. ‘Yes, I can afford that. It's…’
The academic raised his hand. ‘Thirty-eight gold pieces,’ he said, his eyes narrowing, ‘and a small favour.’
v
West Side: 24th Staircase
As the shadows grew longer and the lamps lining the Central Viaduct far above their heads were lit, the group of mistsifters on the twenty-fourth set of steps huddled closer together. Most of them were sub-acolytes and apprentices who, like sub-acolytes and apprentices all over Sanctaphrax, would gather to carp and complain about their professors. However, the presence of the school's dean, sub-professor and various readers, both senior and junior, lent extra weight to this evening's criticisms.
‘He's so intent on appearing fair that he's forgotten all about us mistsifters,’ one of the apprentices complained.
‘Yeah,’ said another, nodding vigorously. ‘It's like he's going out of his way to prove that everyone's equal. Why, even that little scrot, Dervillus – you know, that drizzle character – has been promoted.’
‘And since he's moved into that old palace, he's been even worse!’ added a third.
‘You're right,’ said a fourth. ‘I've even heard rumours that he's preparing to increase the power and influence of the Professors of Light and Darkness. And at our expense!’ He glared round him. ‘It's we mistsifters who should be up for preferments, not them!’
Runnet listened as a ripple of angry agreement went round.
A tall, senior reader with a waxed, white moustache raised his hand to his mouth and whispered to his squat neighbour conspiratorially, ‘They're right, of course. Not that we'll ever be able to prove anything until it's too late…’
‘No, that's the problem,’ came the hushed reply. Runnet turned towards them and tentatively held out a piece of folded parchment. ‘I don't know if this counts as proof,’ he muttered.
The short, stocky dean leaned forwards and took it from his hand. He opened it up. The senior reader peered over his shoulder, twiddling his moustache as he scanned the words on the parchment.
‘Upon my spirit!’ he exclaimed.
‘Sacred Sky!’ gasped the dean.
The apprentices broke off mid-gossip and looked round.
‘It's his writing,’ the dean was saying. ‘Definitely. In my position, I get to see it enough.’ He turned to Runnet. ‘Who gave you this?’
‘I … I found it,’ said Runnet, his cheeks reddening.
‘But how could he?’ the senior reader broke in. He shook his head. ‘Seftus Leprix isn't going to be happy.’
‘About what?’ the apprentices chorused as they clustered round, each one trying to see for himself what was written on the piece of parchment.
‘Yes,’ came a voice. ‘What exactly is it that I won't be happy about?’
‘Leprix old fellow,’ said the dean. ‘We were just…’ He frowned, and handed him the sheet of paper. ‘You'd better read this.’
As the others watched, the expression on the face of Seftus Leprix went through various changes – from bemusement, through horror, to utter outrage. ‘I … I don't know what to say,’ he spluttered.
‘Don't you worry,’ said the senior reader. ‘We won't allow it to happen.’
‘What? What? What?’ the apprentices and sub-acolytes were clamouring. ‘What's happened?’
The dean puffed out his chest, pulled himself up to his full height and turned to address them. ‘According to this letter – written by the Most High Academe himself – he is proposing to make the Sub-Dean of the School of Light and Darkness our new sub-dean.’ He shook his head darkly. ‘It's the thin end of the wedge, you mark my words.’
‘And what of Seftus Leprix?’ asked Runnet, just as he had been instructed to do by the character with the silver nose-piece. ‘We won't stand idly by while he's dismissed.’
A murmur of rebellious agreement rumbled round the group of apprentices and junior readers.
‘He is to become …’ the dean paused and shuddered, ‘a sub-librarian.’
‘Can you believe it?’ said the senior reader, his moustache trembling with indignation. ‘Our so-called Most High Academe is planning on reviving the Great Library.’
There was a gasp of amazement. The Great Library, with its dusty scrolls full of mumbo-jumbo, belonged to the past; it had no place in Sanctaphrax these days.
Runnet spoke for them all when he cried out indignantly, ‘What's the world coming to when earth-studies is preferred to sky-scholarship?’
Another ripple of anger went round the group of apprentices, and before long all of them were demanding that justice be done and action be taken.
‘Before he gets rid of our sub-dean, perhaps we ought to get rid of him,’ said one – half seriously, half tongue-in-cheek.
‘Yeah,’ said another, warming to the theme. ‘After all, what use is he to any of us now?’
‘No use at all,’ another chipped in. ‘In fact quite the opposite. Actual harm, he's doing the School of Mist.’
‘And not just the School of Mist,’ said another. ‘Every sky-scholar of Sanctaphrax will suffer if his half-baked plans should go ahead.’
‘Earth-studies scum!’ grumble
d someone else. ‘We've got to stop him.’
‘Yeah, well, if he was ever to suffer from an unfortunate accident,’ said a young sub-acolyte with spiky red hair, ‘I know just where it would be.’
‘That precious low-sky cage of his,’ said an apprentice.
‘Precisely,’ said the sub-acolyte, with a smirk. ‘Bars can buckle. Chains can snap…’
Runnet looked round at his fellow mistsifters gratefully. The character on the twelfth staircase had promised him the examination answers if he could stir up trouble amongst the mistsifters. It had been easier than he'd hoped. These academics were a treacherous lot, he thought with a smile.
His task complete, Runnet turned and made his way down the Steps. Now all he had to do was pick up the examination answers from the mysterious professor, and learn them. Up in the sky, the East Star began to twinkle. And as a following breeze began to blow, he caught a whiff of something familiar – woodcamphor. And tallow…
· CHAPTER SIX ·
THE LOW-SKY CAGE
It was approaching midnight yet, tired as he was, Quint couldn't sleep. He was up and pacing back and forth, his head spinning with question after unanswered question.
‘Why does Maris hate me?’ he muttered as he approached the door. ‘What exactly does the Most High Academe want from me? What is so important about that barkscroll I fetched for him?’ He twisted round on his heels and marched back to the window. ‘Who was it that broke my fall and saved me from certain death in the Great Library?’
So many questions! He shook his head. Once life had seemed so simple.
Outside, small clouds drifted across the face of the waning moon. Small clouds and … Quint paused and squinted. ‘A sky ship,’ he whispered.
‘Oh, Father, why did you leave me here in Sanctaphrax with its horrible schools of Gossip, Rumour and Treachery, surrounded by shiftless academics – not to mention Miss High-and-Mighty Maris? Why can't I be with you, Father? Far away. With the moon in my eyes and the wind in my hair…’
He sighed, and was closing the window when there was a sharp rap at the door. ‘It's not locked,’ Quint called, and turned to see the handle moving. ‘You again,’ he said, surprised to see the spindlebug standing there so late.
‘Indeed,’ said Tweezel, nodding dolefully. ‘I'd turned in for the night, only to be summoned by his lordship's bell the moment my head touched the block.’ He sniffed. ‘He wants to see you again.’
‘Me?’ said Quint.
‘At once,’ said Tweezel, his antennae quivering with agitation. ‘If not sooner. And take your cape,’ he added.
‘My cape …’ said Quint, scanning the room for it. ‘Will we be going outside then?’ he asked.
‘I wouldn't know,’ said Tweezel. ‘I'm just passing on his lordship's instructions.’ He spotted Quint's cape in a heap beside the desk and picked it up with one set of long, glinting pincers. ‘Here,’ he said.
‘Thanks,’ said Quint. He slipped it over his shoulders and made his way towards the door. As he passed Tweezel, he paused. A row of round black objects were moving steadily along the internal tubes and pipes which led to the spindlebug's huge, transparent stomach. ‘A late supper?’ he said.
‘The young mistress baked them specially for me,’ said Tweezel proudly.
‘That was kind of her…’
‘Spiced scones,’ he explained. ‘A trifle over-done, but delicious nevertheless.’
Quint smiled. ‘Rather you than me,’ he muttered.
‘Yes, well, the young mistress appreciates my work around …’ Tweezel began. But Quint had already gone. ‘… the palace.’ He shook his head. ‘Unlike some,’ he grumbled.
Linius Pallitax, the Most High Academe of Sanctaphrax, was already pacing the landing by the time Quint reached the floor with the master-study on it. As well as his stave, the professor was holding an unlit tallow-lantern in his hand.
‘There you are, lad!’ he exclaimed and, seizing him by his arm, dragged him back along the corridor. ‘Come, come, come,’ he said. ‘We have urgent work to do.’
‘Is this to be another task?’ asked Quint eagerly.
‘It is,’ said Linius. ‘But let us wait until we are outside before we discuss the details. I'm all too aware that there is a whispering campaign against me. The last thing I want to do is fuel it with any ill-chosen remarks that might be overheard.’
‘Even here?’ said Quint surprised.
‘Even here,’ Linius confirmed darkly.
They continued along the corridor, down the stairs and across the hallway in silence. Outside, they went down the marble staircase and, having checked there was no-one lurking in the shadows, Linius turned left. Far in front of them stood the gleaming winch-towers of the West Landing.
Quint shivered.
‘It's cold,’ he said. ‘The cloudwatchers are forecasting snow,’ came the gloomy reply. Linius increased his stride. ‘Which is why we must act as soon as possible.’
‘I … I don't understand,’ said Quint, wrapping his cape around him as he trotted to keep up with the professor.
‘The cages are difficult enough to operate at the best of times,’ Linius explained, ‘but with snow and ice in the air, they can be positively perilous.’
‘The cages?’ said Quint. ‘We're going down in one of the low-sky cages? I didn't think anyone used them any more.’
‘I do,’ said the Most High Academe simply, and added, ‘I take it your father, Wind Jackal, has instructed you in the rudiments of skysailing.’
‘Yes,’ said Quint, a little confused. ‘Yes, he has.’
‘Good,’ said Linius. ‘For there is a similarity between skysailing and the operating of the cages. These days, of course, the trainee Knights Academic use training ships in Undertown, but once upon a time they learnt the basics of sky-flight in the cages.’
Quint nodded, but did not comment. Since he had no intention of staying in Sanctaphrax a moment longer than necessary, he was unwilling to discuss the Knights' Academy. Linius did not seem to notice his silence.
‘I love Sanctaphrax by night,’ he was saying, ‘without all the hustle and bustle of the daytime activity. The baskets, arriving and departing; the constant noise.’ He turned to Quint. ‘I mean, I know that we academics depend on the good creatures of Undertown for our survival but, oh my, how loud they can be! Squabbling, shouting, touting for trade. Every day, I long for midnight, when the last of them go back to their Undertown homes and Sanctaphrax returns to what it should always be – a place of peace, quiet and academic reflection…’
Just then, from a building to their left, came a piercing howl of surprise followed by a roar of scornful laughter. A chant rose up. ‘Down the bung-hole! Down the bung-hole! Down the bung-hole!’
Quint turned to Linius questioningly. The professor sighed.
‘Some of us are perhaps better at academic reflection than others,’ he said.
‘Who are they?’ asked Quint.
‘Stormwatchers,’ said Linius, raising his eyes impatiently. ‘In the middle of one of their ridiculous initiation ceremonies by the sound of it.’ He frowned. ‘Stormwatchers can be as unpredictable as the weather conditions they record.’
As he and Quint continued on their way, the sounds of carousing faded away behind them. The silence returned; heavy, impenetrable. The Most High Academe might have loved it, but Quint did not. It felt eerie to him; unnatural – and perhaps because he found it hard to believe that the place he'd always seen thronging with people could be so empty, Quint started imagining faces in the shadows, eyes peeking out from every nook and cranny. When he looked closer, there was never anyone there – yet he couldn't shake off the feeling of being observed.
On the approach to the great landing now, with the wooden boards groaning beneath their feet, the professor steered Quint towards an ancient-looking cage which creaked gently in the breeze. It was suspended in mid-air from a winch near the end of the stage. The professor strode over to it, released the cotter-pin
lock and brought the cage up on its chain with a rusty clang till it was at the same level as the landing-stage itself. Then he unlatched the barred door. It creaked open.
‘After you,’ he said.
Quint stared at the dangling contraption with some trepidation. Unlike the hanging-baskets which carried passengers up and down between Sanctaphrax and Undertown, the low-sky cage was ancient. With its spindly frame, its caged buoyant-rock and the tarnished funnels and pipes, it looked so fragile, so rickety …
‘It's safer than it looks,’ Linius assured him as he climbed into his seat in the cage. Inside, he lit both his own lantern and the lamp hanging from the frame by his head before turning back to Quint. ‘But then, as I said, there's always an element of danger in cage-riding – especially with ice in the air.’
Quint swallowed. Above his head, a snowbird soared across the sky, mewling like a babe-in-arms. With his teeth clenched, and trying hard to be brave, Quint gripped the frame of the door and stepped into the cage. It swung wildly to and fro. The professor leant across him and secured the door.
‘Right, then,’ he said. ‘This is the up-down whatchamacallit and these are the lever things…’
‘The weight-levers,’ said Quint, nodding knowingly. ‘They're simpler than those on the helm of the Galerider, but if it's anything like a sky ship then they should maintain our angle, speed and balance.’
The professor was impressed. ‘So, do you think you can handle it?’
Quint leant forwards and pulled one of the levers towards him, then pushed a second one back. The cage responded by tilting first this way, then that. He nodded appreciatively. ‘The weights have been well-tuned,’ he said. ‘Shall we go?’
‘At once,’ said Linius Pallitax. ‘Before it gets any colder.’ He patted the pocket of his gown. ‘It's time I discovered how accurately I have translated that barkscroll you brought me. The Old Woodscript can be tricky at times. I just hope I haven't made too many mistakes …’ He paused and an expression of utter weariness passed across his face. ‘Sky willing it will prove accurate enough. Come, Quint. Let us descend.’