The Smoking Hourglass

by Jennifer Bell

  Ivy listened carefully. The torch was clicking. As Valian waved it over the walls, the clicking sped up or slowed down depending on where he positioned it. In no time at all he’d pinpointed Selena’s response.

  ‘I still can’t see it,’ Ivy said, drawing closer. ‘There’s too much other writing here.’

  Valian flicked the torch switch again, and the pattern of clicks changed. ‘It’s in Morse code now; it should spell out the message for us. Seb – write this down.’

  Seb made notes on his phone as Valian deciphered a string of letters from the pattern of dots and dashes.

  ‘I ask the masters of death to change my future,’ Seb read when the torch had finished. ‘The “masters of death” must mean the Dirge – it’s as if Selena wanted their help.’

  The sound of a knife being sharpened filled the tunnel, and the floor trembled. Ivy steadied herself. ‘What’s happening?’

  The walls drew back, and the tunnel got bigger. There was a loud clang, and the end of the passageway opened like the pupil of an eye into a dark cave with a low ceiling. The three of them got to their feet and edged in slowly.

  The air was cold and damp. Pillars of sandy rock stood sandwiched between floor and ceiling, casting strange shadows. Somewhere in the distance, water was dripping. Ivy flinched as the tunnel entrance closed behind them with a loud scrape. ‘Where are we?’

  Valian stuffed his torch back into his pocket and retrieved his uncommon trowel. It was glowing. ‘Dead here. Hide.’

  They managed to dive behind the nearest pillar just in time.

  A man in a long-tailed velvet coat stepped through the cave wall close by. He had a handsome face with deep-set dark eyes and thick black hair. His high leather boots didn’t touch the ground.

  Ivy squinted. There was something familiar about the line of his jaw.

  Amos Stirling …?

  She studied him carefully. He was much older than the boy from the postcard, but it was the same person – except that now he was dead. The Great Uncommon Bag must have delivered them to Amos; he’d just been following Selena.

  Amos crouched, his eyes shifting from side to side. From his pocket he produced a glass conical flask containing a measure of glittering blue liquid and placed it on the cave floor. He took a light bulb from his other pocket, which he balanced in the neck of the flask. Protecting his fist with his sleeve, he smashed the bulb.

  Two streams of white light shot out, twirling in mid-air. They contorted into the shapes of two people – one hooded and wearing a mask, the other a woman with a long dark plait.

  ‘A mixologist’s lightprint,’ Valian whispered excitedly. ‘I’ve never actually seen one before. The light re-creates whatever just happened in this room.’

  The hooded person began talking. ‘There will be no turning back, Miss Grimes. The process is irreversible.’ He had a deep, coarse voice that set the liquid in the flask trembling. ‘The trade is simple: we will transform you into a ghoul and, in payment, you will serve us in any way we require.’

  Ivy shuddered. Why on earth had Selena Grimes asked the Dirge to change her into a ghoul? She watched curiously as Selena’s figure handed over what appeared to be a violin.

  ‘Your soul will fracture in two,’ the masked man told her, holding the instrument aloft. ‘The larger part will form a ghoul, but the other piece will remain trapped inside this object, which we shall keep. If you decide to break our agreement at any time, we will reconnect the two parts of your soul and you will become Departed. You will cease to be.’

  Ivy couldn’t believe it. The Dirge could turn the living into the dead and they had mastered the secret of turning the dead into the Departed! Perhaps that was what all their forbidden research had amounted to.

  Amos shook his head.

  With a loud crackle, Selena’s form dissolved and another stream of light surged out of the broken bulb, shaping itself into a different person in a hood and mask.

  The original masked man lowered his head. ‘My leader, Blackclaw. The contract with Selena Grimes is done.’ Ivy realized with a sinking feeling that they had been joined by her great-grandfather Octavius Wrench: he was the Fallen Guild’s leader! ‘I am also pleased to announce the successful capture of two further members of the Rasavatum. As with the others, if they will not swear loyalty, they will be disposed of.’

  ‘Good work, Monkshood,’ Blackclaw remarked in a clear, rich voice. ‘Pity about Amos Stirling. So talented a person would have been useful. Still, the library is the only prize of interest. Given access to a thousand years of mixology, we can master the art ourselves.’

  Ivy swallowed. The Dirge hadn’t persuaded the Rasavatum to serve them at all; they’d dismantled their guild, picking off members one by one – and Amos Stirling had been one of their victims.

  A high-pitched metallic scrape resonated through the cave. Immediately Amos knocked the smashed bulb onto the floor and stowed the conical flask back in his pocket. The figures of light vaporized.

  A circular stainless-steel panel appeared in the cave wall and started to open like a pupil. Ivy pressed herself back against the pillar. The three of them were within sight of whoever was about to enter, but if they tried to move, Amos would see them. She retrieved the Great Uncommon Bag from her satchel, reminding herself that if they were discovered in 1967, the ramifications would be catastrophic.

  ‘We’re going,’ she decided. ‘Now.’

  Crawling out into their room at the Cabbage Moon, Ivy found Seb and Valian glowering in the direction of the bunks.

  ‘Johnny Hands?’ she exclaimed, getting to her feet. The ghoul was sitting on her bed, his feet floating a few inches off the floor. He glimpsed the Great Uncommon Bag and a line appeared between his brows.

  ‘Welcome back,’ he said, adding, ‘I’m here to escort you to my master. We don’t have much time.’

  Valian folded his arms. ‘Your master? I thought you were an independent scout, like me.’

  Ivy recalled her conversation with Johnny Hands in the infirmary. With everything that had happened since, she’d forgotten to tell Valian or Seb. ‘Why does Mr Punch want to see us?’

  Johnny Hands rose to his feet. ‘He will explain himself, but we have to be quick,’ he said urgently. ‘Follow me.’

  ‘Whoa – hold everything,’ Valian said, gesticulating wildly. ‘You work for Mr Punch? Since when?’

  Johnny Hands counted on his fingers. ‘Let me see … Probably for coming up to two hundred years.’ He went to open the door. After seeing him dissolve through the roof of the featherlight mailhouse, Ivy wasn’t sure why he was bothering. ‘Now please, come along.’

  Seb scanned the room. ‘Hang on, where’s Judy? She was meant to meet us here.’

  ‘Mr Littlefair sent her on an errand,’ Johnny Hands said dismissively, brushing a hand through the air. ‘Now, I really must insist: hurry!’

  Outside Mr Punch’s curiosity shop, a green silk ribbon was writing in the air:

  The last time Ivy had visited Mr Punch’s shop it was a small brick house – painted fig-purple – with a slate roof and wrought-iron shop sign. Inside, Ivy had discovered a collection of uncommon objects stored in glass cabinets, wooden trunks and jewelled chests.

  That was then.

  Facing Ivy now was a colossal purple big top, the kind you’d see at a circus, the peaks so steep and tall, they looked like a mountain range at dusk. Waving furiously atop each one was a white flag decorated with Mr Punch’s logo – a black top hat.

  ‘I’ll wait here,’ Johnny Hands said, hovering by the entrance.

  Ivy smoothed down her kurta before heading in, Seb and Valian trudging along behind.

  It was dark and quiet inside the tent. Boxes sat in shadow around the walls while, in the centre, a white spotlight lit up the sandy floor. On either side stood two towers accessed by rope ladders, with a trapeze hanging between them. The sounds of Lundinor were muffled by the thick walls, so the crunch of their footsteps echoed loudly.

>   ‘Hello?’ Ivy called.

  There was a clatter, and then the spotlight moved slowly across the tent, coming to rest on a platform at the top of one of the towers. Ivy saw a man in a black top hat sitting there, his legs hanging over the edge.

  ‘That’s him,’ Valian said quietly. ‘Mr Punch.’

  ‘It’s safe to climb the ladder,’ a deep voice called down. ‘I knotted it myself.’

  Ivy surveyed the platform from a distance. It was a strange place to have a meeting – but, hey, this was Lundinor. At the foot of the rope ladder she swung her satchel round and began to climb, Seb and Valian following behind. From the top, the tent looked even bigger.

  ‘Here you go,’ Mr Punch said, shuffling along to make room. The platform was crammed with cases and boxes stuffed with uncommon objects. ‘Sorry about my collection – it never seems to fit in here as well as it does in a proper building.’

  Seb sat down beside a grey stone plinth, his knees drawn up to his chest. Valian shuffled up between a rusty oilcan and a large model sailing boat. Ivy took the space beside Mr Punch. ‘I was told that you were behind the transformation of Lundinor,’ she said, letting her legs hang over the edge like his. ‘Can’t you just change the tent whenever you want?’

  ‘Ah, but it doesn’t work like that,’ Mr Punch told her, tipping his hat to Seb and Valian. ‘Good to meet you both at last.’ He pointed to the plinth beside Seb. ‘That stone does all the work.’

  Ivy regarded the grey stone plinth. The pedestal was carved with winged horses and five-pointed stars, and an old book with yellowed pages was lying open on top of it. ‘The plinth?’ she asked.

  ‘You could call it a plinth,’ Mr Punch said. ‘Over the centuries it’s had many names: lectern, podium, easel … I call it a stone.’

  ‘Hang on – this plinth transforms the whole of Lundinor?’ Seb leaned away from it, staring. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘The stone is fond of books,’ Mr Punch explained with a shrug. ‘If you lay one open on top of it, the stone manifests certain aspects of that book in real life.’

  Ivy considered the grassy meadows, trees and flowers growing in Lundinor; one uncommon plinth had done all that. ‘So you lay a different book on top of the stone every season?’ she asked.

  Mr Punch opened a gleaming mother-of-pearl chest beside him. It was full of objects, including several leather-bound books. ‘A Dickens every winter,’ he explained. ‘That’s traditional. Something sunny for spring – this year I used Mary Poppins in the Park – and in autumn it’s whatever takes my fancy. The stone is very rare, as you can imagine. I wouldn’t be able to sell it for less than ten grade.’

  There was a clatter as Valian knocked over the oilcan. ‘What?!’

  Ivy felt like she’d just had the wind knocked out of her. She scanned the big top, checking they were still alone. There were only five objects in existence that had a grade-ten value. ‘The stone is one of the Great Uncommon Good?’

  Mr Punch’s eyes twinkled as he took a Russian doll out of the chest – a man in traditional Russian costume. ‘Let me tell you a little about where that phrase comes from,’ he said, holding the doll on his flattened palm. ‘Many hundreds of years ago, when tales of five grade-ten objects first surfaced, one man decided to collect the stories together and give each object a name. The bag that you and your friends possess was called the Sack of Stars, and sitting behind us is the Stone of Dreams. It was this same man who named the objects the Great Uncommon Good, believing that they would do extraordinarily good things.’

  The Sack of Stars. That’s what they should be calling it. Listening to the story, Ivy guessed that the Jar of Shadows still had its original name. She wondered what the other two objects might be.

  ‘But of course the story collector soon realized that, in the wrong hands, the Great Uncommon Good could do extraordinarily bad things,’ Mr Punch continued, opening the Russian doll to reveal a set of ever-smaller figures. ‘So he set about forming a guild of uncommoners who would hunt down the five objects and keep them hidden from the rest of the world. The guild was called the Rasavatum.’

  Ivy shared a look of confusion with Seb and Valian. ‘I thought the Rasavatum were mixologists.’

  Mr Punch blew on the Russian dolls and they began moving of their own accord. A lady in a red dress curtsied to Ivy; a man brushed down his suit, stretching his legs. ‘The original members were talented mixologists,’ Mr Punch explained. ‘They needed to conceal the work they were really doing, so they used their mixologist skills to build a reputation as a troupe of mysterious showmen. It allowed them to travel from undermart to undermart, gathering information on the Great Uncommon Good without anyone knowing what they were really up to. It was a fantastic disguise.’ At that word, the Russian dolls’ faces froze and they jumped inside each other in ascending order of size, till only the original man remained. Mr Punch tapped him on the head, smiling. ‘Over the centuries, members of the Rasavatum have come and gone, but two things remain: our masquerade as mixologists, and our promise to conceal the Great Uncommon Good.’

  ‘Our?’ Seb cocked his head. ‘You’re a member of the Rasavatum?’

  Mr Punch returned the Russian doll to the chest and closed the lid. ‘The very last one. The Dirge made it their mission to discover our identities and hunt us down, but it was against our oath to fight – we are a peaceful guild committed to non-violence.’

  ‘So that’s why the Rasavatum went into hiding,’ Ivy said. An army of questions marched into her head. She guessed there were few people Mr Punch could trust with the truth, especially with half the Dirge’s identities still a mystery. She peered into his swirling eyes, contemplating the multiple souls coexisting inside him. She couldn’t imagine the extent of his knowledge or the number of secrets he was guarding.

  ‘Sir Clement was a member of the Rasavatum,’ Mr Punch said. ‘He used the Stone of Dreams to build Lundinor, and the object has been under the protection of our guild ever since. Fifty years ago another of our members tracked down the Jar of Shadows. Since then, I have endeavoured to keep it out of the Dirge’s reach.’

  Ivy blushed. ‘So it was you who hid it in the Skaptikon?’

  Mr Punch nodded solemnly. There was no anger on his face, only regret. He pulled his legs up onto the platform, turning round so he was facing Seb and Valian. ‘Under no circumstances must the Dirge be allowed to wield the power of one of the Great Uncommon Good. As guardians of the Sack of Stars, you three must keep it hidden from Selena at all costs.’

  Valian’s expression hardened as he poked around in his inside pocket, checking that the Great Uncommon Bag – the Sack of Stars – was still there. ‘Selena Grimes – you know who she really is?’

  ‘I have known since you three unmasked Cartimore Wrench as Ragwort,’ Mr Punch said with a scowl. ‘I discovered Selena’s true identity by tracing the grim-wolf back to her. The creature has since left her employment.’

  ‘If you know who she is, why can’t she be arrested?’ Seb asked. ‘The underguard will believe you, surely.’

  ‘The underguard will listen to me,’ Mr Punch agreed. ‘But they will not take action without proof. Selena Grimes won their trust years ago; it will not be brushed aside so easily. In any case, the entire force would be unable to stop her on their own.’ He fastened his cord jacket. ‘After I discovered Selena’s true allegiance I began hunting for an object that I knew would vanquish her. Only this morning I got word that it has been found.’

  Ivy wondered what Mr Punch could be talking about. She had the feeling that he knew everything they’d been getting up to over the last couple of days. Perhaps Johnny Hands had been spying on them.

  ‘The reason I have summoned you here,’ Mr Punch went on urgently, ‘is because I am leaving Lundinor immediately in order to retrieve the object. I hope to return before the Grivens contest begins so I can stop Selena Grimes from opening the Jar of Shadows. Whatever happens while I’m gone, you must keep the Sack of Stars safe. I fear t
here are other members of the Dirge in Lundinor right now, and they will be watching you three closely.’

  Mr Punch’s story of the Rasavatum and his warning about the Dirge were still running through Ivy’s head when she left the big top. Out on the lawn, people stood in small groups discussing the evening edition of the Lundinor Chronicle. Ivy couldn’t see the headline, but she noticed a few of the traders gawping at her. A cold feeling seeped into her bones. ‘Er … What’s going on?’

  Valian’s eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t know, but I don’t like the look of it.’

  Johnny Hands came shooting across the grass, his jester’s hat wobbling. When he reached them, he dithered, apparently trying to tell them something, but in the end he just shook his head and held up a crisp copy of the Lundinor Chronicle.

  On the front page was a photo of Ivy in the dungarees and cropped black jacket she’d been wearing yesterday. She was grinning from ear to ear, a large bronze trophy cradled in her arms.

  Seb read the headline, his voice growing higher with every word. ‘Eleven-year-old Girl Becomes Final Competitor in Grivens Contest?!’

  Ivy was trying to gasp and speak at the same time. ‘But – that’s not me!’ She grabbed the newspaper to examine it more closely. OK, it did look exactly like her, but unless she had an extreme sleepwalking problem that she didn’t know about, she hadn’t entered herself into the Grivens contest. There had to be another explanation.

  ‘Shapeshifter,’ Valian muttered bitterly. ‘It must be.’

  Ivy scanned the article. ‘It says here that to enter the contest, players had to deposit one of their gloves in the contest master’s cup and then drink from it.’

  ‘Yuck.’ Seb pulled a face. ‘Soggy glove juice – what’s that all about?’

  ‘The drinking part is customary,’ Johnny Hands explained. ‘Grivens contests were always presided over by a contest master – a referee. They were chosen from a handful of retired ex-players, and it was traditional to use one of their old trophies as a cup into which new contestants could deposit their gloves.’