by Tad Williams
"Cer . . . certainly. I have to finish cleaning up here, anyway."
"Am I just allowed to go off like this?" Theo asked. "I mean, don't these Daffodil people want to know where I am at all times or something?" Applecore snorted. "These aren't the folks who asked for you in the first place, Vilmos — those were the Hollyhocks. I had to beg to bring you here to Daffodil House, but now you're safe. It's a good thing for you that Lady Aemilia is so interested in mortals."
"Yeah? Any interest that centers around the application of leeches I can do without." Still, he found himself vaguely disturbed that his hostess and the rest of the Daffodil nobles seemed so little concerned with his whereabouts. "Did you tell her ladyship that people were trying to kill me?"
"Oh, yes. It was one of the things that interested her." Applecore rose and hovered. "I'll go make meself beautiful, boys. Shouldn't take more than a few hours." She laughed as she turned and flew out.
Cumber Sedge watched the fast-disappearing glint of her wings. "She's . . . really nice. Are you . . . if you don't mind my asking . . . have you . . ." A hectic patch on each cheek darkened all the way to milk-chocolate. "Is she your girlfriend?"
————— It was better than a cafeteria, Theo had to admit. The Gatehouse was a small, pleasant restaurant at the base of the Daffodil House tower on the edge of what was more or less a moat, halfway across the complex from the real gatehouse in the outer wall. Bathed by the silvery gleams of concealed spotlights, the moat might have been the remains of something that once had been practical, but now instead of guardsmen or walls it surrounded thick banks of rushes, a few artfully pruned willows, and a good half-mile of paths with ornamental bridges and benches set out at intervals so that the most picturesque spots could be viewed in comfort. The food in this newer gatehouse was good, although Theo was not entirely in love with Fairyland cuisine, which relied a bit too much on honey, clotted cream, and flower petals for his tastes.
"So were these places here before there was a city?" Theo asked. "Many of them, I suppose." Cumber Sedge was on his second glass of wine and was beginning to loosen up. He already had a splotch of mint jelly on his gray shirt. "I'm afraid I'm not very good with ancient history. The City is built out from the site of the first mound, you know — some even claim it began before there was a king and queen, but I don't believe them — so it's very, very old. Anyway, I'm pretty certain that the Daffodil family castle has been in the same place a long time, like the Hellebores and the Primroses. Apparently the established families like to build on the site of older buildings, or incorporate them."
"You say it like you've only heard about it. Aren't you one of them? A Daffodil?" Applecore, sitting on a tiny chair and eating at a tiny table set on the tablecloth between Theo and Cumber, gave a little snort, then picked up her tiny bowl of dandelion wine and had another drink.
Cumber smiled apologetically. "She's laughing because I'm not a Daffodil — I'm not from one of the Flower Houses at all." "That's not why I laughed," she said. "Some great eejit just fell in the moat outside." A few of the restaurant's other patrons were also staring out the picture windows at the commotion down by the water.
"Ah. That looks like Zirus and his friends. Zirus Jonquil — Lady Aemilia's son. He and his friends can be rather . . . sporty. We were at school together. Not that they ever took much notice of me."
"So you're from a different family?" Theo asked. His venison had been quite good, simple but well-cooked; now he was enjoying the wine and beginning to wonder if people in Faerie smoked cigarettes or even cigars, and how he might get hold of such a thing. "I was wondering why your name wasn't Titus or Taurus or Doofius or something like that."
"A different family?" Cumber let out a sort of shamed giggle. "A different species, almost. I'm a ferisher." "A what?" Theo was distracted by a thump and jingle from the front door as several youthful-looking fairies pushed into the restaurant and up to the bar, talking and laughing loudly.
"Ferisher. You haven't heard of us? We're domestic fairies, mostly. My mother was one of Lady Aemilia's nurses." He looked sideways at Applecore. "She's been very kind to me, Lady Aemilia. When she found out how much I liked to read, she always gave me books. And she even sent me to school with her own boys. I was the first ferisher they ever had at Great Ring Academy . . ."
"Look who's here! It's old Cumberbumber!" A figure lurched up to their table, his appearance so loud and sudden that Theo flinched. "Well, Good Mabon Eve to you, Sedge. I can't believe my mother actually let you out of that dungeon of stinks where she keeps you locked up!"
"Hello, Zirus." Sedge's smile was a little nervous. "Good Mabon Eve to you, too. I like it in the lab. I like the work." "Work — bloody Bark and Root, who wants to work? Had enough of that back in school." The tall young fairy yanked an empty chair away from another table, startling the table's occupants, and sat on it splay-legged and backward, tipping back and forth between Theo and Cumber. He was dark-haired, very handsome — the resemblance to his mother's chiseled features was easy to see — and seemed by the standards of his kind to be quite, quite drunk. "Who's your chum, Cumberbumber? Old family friend?"
"Yes, he's a friend," said Cumber, and gave Theo what looked very much like a warning look. The young fairy lord offered Theo his hand and Theo took it, not quite sure of what he was supposed to do. He gave it a shake that turned into sort of a squeeze, then let go. If he had done anything wrong, the scion of Jonquil House appeared not to have noticed. "Pleasure to meet you, all that. Zirus Jonquil, me. Don't mind what those others over there tell you — they're all potted." He gestured at the bar, where several of his friends were standing a little unsteadily, although their natural grace was such that Theo was only now getting to the point where he could tell the difference between sober and unsober fairies. "You are?"
"Theodorus," he said. Applecore flitted up to his shoulder and whispered a suggestion in his ear. "Theodorus weft-Daisy." "A country cousin!" said Zirus. "Welcome to the big, bad city. What do you think? Your first visit?" He turned to his friends. "There's a lad here fresh in from Rowan." He turned back to Theo and Cumber Sedge as his friends at the bar shouted what sounded like genial insults at the out-oftowner. "Say, what are you fellows doing tonight?"
"We're just having dinner . . ." Cumber began. "No, you're coming with us — it's a holiday, isn't it? Bring your friend." Zirus squinted blearily just a bit to the side of Theo's face, and for a moment Theo thought the fairy lord was going to be sick. "Hoy, who's that? There's someone on your shoulder, Daisy."
"Her name is Applecore."
"I'm a friend of your mother's," the sprite said, a bit sternly.
"Ooh." Zirus grinned. "Then you'd better come along too, so she doesn't find out where we're going until it's all over."
"Go where?" "The most wonderful club. Very new. Everyone's talking. And they will be until it closes in a week or so and they're talking about something else." Zirus chortled. "Come 'long. I insist. Haven't seen old Cumberbumber here for a shuck-dog's age." He grabbed Theo by the arm. He had his mother's grip, and Theo found himself pulled up onto his feet. "I insist. We'll go in my coach. The rest of this lot can find their own way." He tugged Theo toward the front of the restaurant with Applecore buzzing along beside their heads and Cumber Sedge hurrying along after.
"Don't we have to pay for our dinners . . . ?" Theo asked as they reached the door. "Pay? Rubbish. Hoy, Needle! Put it on my bill!" The bent old fairy behind the counter didn't look pleased, but didn't say anything as they banged out the door and into the cold evening air. "He's probably a bit miffed because I haven't settled my tab in a few months," Zirus confided to Theo as he hurried them down a winding path toward the compound's front gate. "Mother is being dreadfully stingy about advances on my allowance. Hoy! I'll go wake up that lazy driver of mine. I can see him sleeping from here!"
As Zirus skipped off toward a long limousine that was idling in a little parking lot just beside the gate, Theo slowed down until Cumber Sedge caught up
with him. "Do we have to do this?"
Cumber shrugged, embarrassed. "It's not a good idea to say no to Zirus. He's like his mother — curious about things. He'll just get even more interested in you and start asking questions, and not necessarily only around Daffodil House. I'm lucky — most of the time, he forgets I exist."
"Come on, you lot!" Zirus shouted. "I don't like it," said Applecore quietly in Theo's ear. "But at least we're not likely to get picked up by the constables while we're out with him — nobody arrests a Flower."
"It's not being arrested I'm worrying about," whispered Theo, remembering Rufinus weft-Daisy slumped on the train station bench. But Zirus Jonquil was trotting back toward them in a not entirely straight line, waving his arms and urging them to hurry.
"Sorry, sorry, this is all my fault," said Cumber Sedge. "By the way," Theo asked Applecore, "I understand the 'Daisy' part, but why do you keep telling people my name is 'weft-Daisy'? What does 'weft' mean?"
"Bastard," she said. "Don't look at me like that, ya thick — I'm just telling you what the word means."
————— Zirus Jonquil kept talking as they rode across town, a drunken but also highly entertaining recitation about silly people and unusual events that Theo felt sure he would find even more amusing if he knew any of the subjects or even a bit more about the world in which they all lived. A lot of the stories seemed to be about people getting into trouble in places they shouldn't be, off their own turf. To hear Zirus tell it, these shenanigans sounded a bit like the early parts of West Side Story, funny and more exciting than dangerous, but as Theo looked out the car window at some of the bleak, run-down neighborhoods they were now crossing, he thought the area itself looked like some of the less charming parts of Los Angeles, more like Bloods and Crips than Sharks and Jets.
"Where are we going, exactly?" he asked Cumber. "This club?" "I'm not certain," said the researcher. "But it does seem a bit far — I think we're already at the far end of the Eventide District. Zirus, where are we going?"
"Just into Moonlight." Their host's tone was light, but Theo could tell by the uneasy look on Cumber's face that it was not such a minor thing.
"This isn't good, Theo," Applecore whispered in his ear. "Ask him what the name of the club is." When Theo did, Zirus smiled and drained another glass of something he had poured himself from the bar built into the car door. "Oh, you probably haven't heard of it — it's only been open a couple of weeks. It's called Christmas and it's quite good." He laughed as Cumber Sedge flinched. "You really have to get out more, Cumberbumber. If the name of the place bothers you, wait until you see the decor!"
"Where exactly is this place, Zirus?" Cumber asked. "I didn't think there were any clubs in Moonlight, just house-towers and government buildings and places like that."
"Ah, but that's what makes this club so good," the young Jonquil lord said. "It's in the basement of Hellebore House."
A six-inch tall sprite had to gulp loudly to be heard so clearly. Theo's uneasy feeling suddenly grew a great deal more intense.
"Not good?" he whispered.
"Very not good," she whispered back. "Oh, stop it, you two," said Zirus. "Everybody makes such a massive fuss about the Hellebores, just because the father's awful and political and the heir is a bit of a strange weed. But some of the younger ones are quite fun in a wild sort of way. Besides, how else would any of us from Daffodil ever get to see the inside of Hellebore House?"
"But I don't want to see the inside of Hellebore House." Cumber had clearly had more to drink than he usually did, and had become ever more silent and morose during the journey. "They're our enemies."
"Enemies!" Zirus shook his head in amused astonishment. "Do you believe all that nonsense about a Flower war? It will never happen. Bark and Root, they're always squabbling in Parliament. The goblins will rise up and execute us all before the houses go to war with each other. Speaking of, this part of Eventide really has gone to seed, hasn't it?" He frowned. Outside the window the streets were crowded again, but it did not seem like a happy scene. Most of the folk on the sidewalk were goblins and what looked to Theo's untutored eye like various kinds of doonies and squat boggarts and other not-quite-human-looking folk. They seemed listless and unfocused, standing or even sitting on the sidewalk in the harsh silvery light of the streetlamps, collected in little knots. Many of them looked sullenly at the car as it slid past them.
Theo remembered something from his great-uncle's book about the shape of the City being a sort of spiral. "So, Daffodil House is in Gloaming, right?" he asked Applecore. "And this is, what, Eventide? And we're going to Moonlight. So does it just keep going? I mean, does it get darker and darker? Is there a Middle-of-the-Night or something?"
"Let's not talk about it," she said.
"Why?"
"Because." "No whispering, you two," said Zirus. "Blast, we're out of brandy." He settled back in the seat and crossed his legs. "What brings you to the City, Daisy?"
"He came with me," Applecore said quickly. "He'd never been and he wanted to do some sight-seeing." "Sight-seeing?" Zirus groaned. "Don't let her drag you around to all that nonsense — Winter Dynasty Bridge, Knocker's Walk, all that. Stick with me, I'll show you the real City."
"That's very kind of you." Theo was wondering how quickly they would be able to shed this young Jonquil lord and get back to Daffodil House. He did not like the idea of being introduced around — what if they ran into someone who really was from Daisytown or whatever the damn place had been called? He could only pray that this would be one of those clubs where the music was so loud you couldn't do anything but nod and smile while people yelled unintelligible questions.
"Speaking of the real City," said Zirus, "We're just coming into Seven Blooms Square. You know all the old stories from the last war with the giants, I'm sure — Sweetpea's Charge, the Battle of the Twilight Bell, all that." Theo knew nothing of the sort, but nodded and tried to look intelligent. "Well, it's all rubbish, at least about the Seven Blooms, and I should know because we Daffodils were one of them. Well, it's not all rubbish, but the bit about the people all cheering when the Seven families announced they were going to create a new parliament, that certainly is. It was all done in secret, and only because they were all tired out from trying to kill each other after the giants were defeated. Nobody was cheering because the king and queen were dead and everyone was terrified. My great-uncle swears on all the Trees that old Otho Primrose was so frightened and shaking so badly that he couldn't have signed the treaty except Lord Violet was helping to hold up his arm."
Theo had no idea what any of it meant, although there were a few faint resonances with things he had read in his own great-uncle's book. He was having trouble thinking clearly and wished he hadn't had the wine. A light spatter of rain on the coach windows broke the strange, witchy lights of the city-center up into a smear of silver and green and blue spots, but it seemed to be getting darker outside rather than brighter, as though they were leaving the well-lit areas behind. In the middle of a long patch of blackness broken only by an occasional streetlamp, the coach slowed and stopped.
"What's going on?" Cumber Sedge didn't seem nervous, just confused, but then he probably didn't have as much to worry about as Theo did. "Checkpoint," explained Zirus. Theo could vaguely make out a dark shape blocking the way, some kind of wall. Low voices spoke for a moment, their own driver no more intelligible than the guards or whatever they were, then the coach again moved forward, but more slowly this time.
"There it is," said Zirus. "Hellebore House. Mad bastards, the lot of 'em, but you have to admit the old place has style." Theo couldn't make out much of anything until the young Daffodil lord flicked his fingers at the door and the window slid silently down, letting in a spatter of misty rain. After Theo blinked the water out of his eyes he saw the huge pale spike.
It was so strange an object that it took him a moment to get the perspective. If it had looked more like an office building or a castle tower it would have happened imm
ediately, but it looked like nothing so much as a kind of ivory chess piece out of some abstract set — a very slender rook or a predatory queen. It was not cylindrical like the Daffodil towers, but four-sided, as far as Theo could tell, although neither of its visible sides were rectangles — not quite, although they looked like they might have started that way. The whole structure seemed to have been stretched out of true, as though a great hand had reached down, grabbed the tower by its spiky, many-gabled roof — an odd contrast with the simplicity of the rest of the building's lines — and yanked on it, pulling it up into the dark sky like a piece of bone-colored taffy. It was lit by carefully arranged spotlights, some with a reddish tint, and all its windows were black. It looked like the shell of an alien animal or a skull with hundreds of eye sockets.
"I . . . I don't like that place." There was more to Theo's aversion than he could express, an alien coldness that came down on him suddenly and with great weight. It reminded him queasily of something — a nightmare? — but he could not remember what it was. He only knew that he was having trouble getting his breath, and that he wished he were somewhere else.
"Why should you like it?" Applecore asked. "They're not nice people in there." Cumber Sedge only mumbled as he stared out the window — the ferisher, Theo realized, was pretty seriously drunk.
"Wait until you see the club," said Zirus, pouring himself another drink. "It's really interesting." Theo had now heard the word "interesting" several times from Lady Aemilia and her son. He was beginning to suspect that it had two meanings for them, and neither of those matched the definition of the word as he had previously known it. One was "horrible." The other was "especially horrible for mortals."
"I don't think I want to see any more interesting things," he announced, but it was far, far too late. They were already in the driveway that led to the main gate. He felt as though something was waiting for him, something dreadful. He hoped it was only that he wasn't used to fairy liquor.