The Curse of Salamander Street

by G. P. Taylor

  ‘See,’ he whispered. ‘They know we have escaped. If you want us to be killed just keep being the knave.’

  ‘I want the Gaudium,’ she said, not caring what was heard of her.

  From over the wall they could hear the harping of music and the rolling of barrels. Thomas peered from their hiding place and listened for the Druggles. They had gone. Looking up, he saw the light of the inn above the wall. Even higher was the meeting place of the roofs that blocked out the night. Holding on to the tallow lamp, Thomas hoisted himself on top of the wall. He bent down and as he twisted grabbed Kate by the arm and began to pull her to him. ‘Climb, Kate,’ he whispered as she scrambled towards him.

  ‘Why?’ she asked.

  ‘Just do it.’

  Kate was pulled upwards until she sat with him on the wall. She looked at him and held out her hand. Thomas jumped to the ground on the far side of the wall and landed in a narrow yard of three brick walls and a doorway into the Salamander Inn.

  A fiddle played and lilted the music back and forth. The door stood unlocked, releasing the sound of many drunken voices.

  ‘We have to take the chance,’ Thomas said. ‘Will you do it?’

  ‘Gaudium …’ she replied, as if to sign the deal. ‘Then I’ll come.’

  Thomas hesitated for a moment. He could feel the pyx in his pocket. It burnt against his hand as if he held a hot coal.

  ‘One drop?’ he asked, knowing she would drink the lot given the chance.

  ‘One drop,’ she replied as a smile lit her face.

  He took the pyx, unscrewed the lid and tipped it upon her hand. A large golden drop the size of several sorrowful tears dripped out. It fell upon her skin with a hiss. Kate licked it quickly as she closed her eyes and held her hand to her mouth. She said nothing. Every thought she had ever had rushed through her mind, and she slumped to the floor. Her eyes burst with a rainbow of colours as the world around her shimmered and the music from the Salamander Inn danced like butterflies before her face.

  ‘Gobwash and turdyguts.’ Kate groaned with a shuddering smile that looked as if it brought new life to her. ‘Can you see it?’ she asked.

  ‘What?’ replied Thomas as he looked about.

  ‘The music. I can see every note, it dances in the air.’

  Thomas looked again. He could see nothing and hear nothing but the dull jangling of the violin and the stamping of many feet in time with its rhythm. From the noise within, it was obvious to him that the beer-house was full of people and a grand bacchanalia was taking place within its walls. The shouts of drunken men echoed from the doors and windows. Here were the people who lived clustered around the inn – men like Pallium, all indebted to Galphus, dangling like puppets.

  ‘We need to find Isabella,’ Thomas said as he listened against the door of the inn.

  ‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’ Kate leered. ‘Find Isabella, fancy that … Thomas in love with a pouting milksop.’

  ‘She wants to help us escape from this place,’ Thomas insisted.

  ‘She knows as little as I do,’ Kate said boldly as she pushed against the door to go in. ‘She wants to kill us both.’

  ‘Galphus …’ Thomas said.

  ‘I care not,’ Kate snorted.

  With that she pushed open the door and shielded her eyes as the sharp light beat against her. A plume of thick blue smoke swelled out like a giant wave. It stank of heavy tobacco and beer and in Kate’s eyes was laced with strings of fine diamonds that danced like snakes upon the breeze.

  The noise was intense. A babble of men grunted and groaned in some foreign language. They cared not for the two who stepped in from the cold night. Their entire gaze was fixed on a pair of fighting birds that danced and squawked upon the floor at the centre of the inn. No one seemed to notice the barefoot lad and dishevelled girl who edged their way slowly into the room.

  In the corner was a fire that spat wood sparks from the grate into the crowded room. A small bench was perched on the hearth. Thomas nodded for Kate to take a seat. He looked for Druggles. To a man, everyone who crowded around the fighting birds was a drunk. They slopped mugs of beer upon the floor, filling them from ornate pot barrels set upon tables. No one paid for their drink, all appeared to be free. They sang raucously, blind to Thomas and Kate as they cheered on the fight.

  Thomas could see that the door to the street was bolted. He took two mugs of beer from a table and pushed his way through the crowds to the fire. Kate held her head in her hands and stared at the flames. She didn’t notice his return, her eyes oblivious to the world.

  ‘Drink this,’ he said as he handed her the mug.

  She sipped the beer that washed against her nose like warm froth. Kate smiled at him and then reached out and touched his face.

  ‘Thomas,’ she said as if they were just met. ‘What are we doing here?’

  ‘Drink it and then we leave,’ he said above the cries of the dying bird as the victor plucked the feathers from its neck.

  The men began to argue, angered by the lack of fight in the vanquished bird. A small vixen-like man grabbed another by the throat and began to peck at him with his fists. The two began to fight and roll about in the beer and sawdust that covered the floor. Thomas stood before Kate as more men joined in.

  Suddenly, a hand grabbed him by the shoulder.

  ‘Thomas,’ said Pallium. ‘I’m glad to see you alive. I heard that you were dead – thought Galphus had killed you.’

  ‘What would you care?’ Thomas said, pushing Pallium from him. He stepped back, grabbing the fire-iron as he stared at Pallium.

  ‘Quickly,’ Pallium said. ‘I know you cannot trust me, but I am with you. Crane needs your help, he is in serious trouble. Galphus betrayed him.’

  ‘More lies?’ Thomas asked as the fight went on about them.

  ‘I can get you from this place. Kate needs to be free from Salamander Street. She will die if she stays here. It is only a matter of time.’

  Thomas looked at him as if every word he spoke dripped from his lips like vile slather.

  ‘Trust me,’ he pleaded. ‘Galphus has me gripped by the Gaudium – just like Kate. I have to do what he says. Now I want to be free.’ Pallium looked ashen and drawn. He nibbled on his fingertips and ducked behind the high back of the oak settle as the fight came closer.

  Kate had returned to the fire. Her mind was lost in the embers. From above her she felt the wafting of a spider as it stirred the air upon its thread. She looked up and watched it fall helplessly from the mantel into the flames. Thomas looked at her and in that moment decided what to do.

  ‘Get us from this place, Pallium. Let this not be a trick or I’ll kill you.’

  ‘I’ll take you to Jacob Crane, that I’ll promise and it will not be a trick.’

  ‘How can we trust you?’ Thomas asked him.

  ‘You can’t,’ he said, ‘but I am the only hope you have of escaping the Druggles.’

  Thomas grabbed Kate and pulled her to her feet and from her dream. Pallium turned and ran to the door. Thomas followed, his hand clasping Kate’s as the small vixen-like man was beaten upon the head with a dead chicken.

  ‘Crane needs you both,’ Pallium pleaded, out of breath as he ran ahead. ‘He is in much distress.’

  They left the Salamander Inn and trotted along the street to Pallium’s house. The sound of the Dragon Heart could be heard chiming far away. It echoed through the roof-capped streets and chased the dust and dirt through the alleyways.

  Kate murmured his words as she ran on. To her left and right she saw faces peering from frosted windows. They were all the same: meagre, sombre and pinched. They had large eyes that stared not at her, but into her. She felt that they all knew who she was and why she was running. She began to weep.

  As they turned the corner the stink of the street began to grow even worse. They knew that they were near to where Pallium lived. The road became darker with no tallow lamps. Pallium ran ahead, waddling like a mother goose in baggy pa
nts.

  The door to the house stood open. Pallium looked for the key in his pocket and then went inside. Kate and Thomas followed.

  ‘Do you have Gaudium?’ she asked him.

  ‘Only enough for the day, only enough for me,’ he chirped happily as if he owned the world. ‘Quickly, there could be Druggles – they know you have escaped and will be searching for you.’

  ‘Why does Galphus keep people here?’ Kate asked.

  ‘It isn’t Galphus, but Salamander Street. Don’t you understand? We are all kept here by who we were before. Victims of our wicked hearts.’ Pallium laughed.

  ‘Before?’ Thomas asked. ‘What do you mean, before?’

  Pallium pulled on the tie that hung loose around his scrawny neck. Taking the key he locked the door and sighed as if in deep contentment. ‘Before I came here I was a businessman. Had many things but wanted happiness. I fell in love and she brought me here. I thought this would be the perfect place but it became a prison.’

  ‘Then escape,’ Thomas said.

  ‘I don’t want to. This is a prison of my own making. Everyone here in Salamander Street would never want to leave. Our desires are fulfilled. Mine is the desire to hold gold coins in my hand, to count them one by one and never be able to spend them. That is pure joy – Gaudium!’ he exclaimed. ‘Galphus has his own vice. He could no more set Jacob Crane free than I ever could.’

  ‘Jacob is still here?’ Thomas asked.

  ‘He is closer than you think,’ Galphus said as the door to the parlour opened and three Druggles stepped into the hallway. In their hands they carried two sets of manacles. Galphus looked to Pallium and nodded in thanks.

  ‘Greatly appreciated,’ he said to the man as he handed him a vial of Gaudium.

  ‘I will kill you,’ Thomas said as the Druggle wrapped his wrists in the metal straps and twisted the bolt into the lock. ‘You promised me, Pallium.’

  ‘I promised you would see Jacob Crane, and that you will – immediately.

  Kate didn’t even realise she was being restrained. She looked to Galphus like a begging dog, holding out her hands as her eyes followed the Gaudium into Pallium’s pocket.

  ‘For me?’ she asked him, her fingers trembling.

  ‘Not yet, my pretty girl, but there will soon come a time when you can have as much as you want and in return all you will give me is a breath.’

  Pallium banged against the wall of the stairs and as he did the oak panel appeared to split in two and slide open. He took the lamp from the table and lit the way. The Druggles followed, then Kate and Thomas and finally Galphus.

  The stone stairs slipped quickly below ground. The scent of the river ebbed through the sewer as a stiff breeze blew cobwebs about their heads.

  ‘See,’ Pallium said, ‘he hadn’t gone far at all.’ Pallium hammered upon a thick black door that blocked the passageway a yard from the stairs. It was a narrow place, just wide enough for a man to stand shoulder to shoulder with another.

  Pallium turned the lock, opened the door and stepped inside. The cell was larger than they had thought. It was lined with dripping stone and at the far wall was a wooden bed. On each side of the door was an oil lamp that hung precariously from a wooden spittle-rod. They gave a bright light that found every corner of the room.

  ‘More guests,’ Galphus said as he pushed them inside.

  It was then that Thomas saw Jacob Crane. He was manacled, crestfallen and bitter.

  ‘Keep your eyes from me,’ he said to Thomas. ‘Don’t look on a man cheated for greed.’

  ‘You sold us for pieces of silver,’ Thomas shouted at him. He lashed out at Crane with his feet.

  A Druggle knocked him to the ground and held him in the stench with his black, red-laced boot.

  ‘I sold nothing – I saw you buried and dead, came looking for you. Galphus said you were in the grave – fell from a window. My only sin was believing he would save my ship.’

  ‘Very true, Jacob, very true,’ Galphus said, laughing to himself. ‘I enjoy to lie, it is far the most exciting thing to do. When you lie you have to remember what you have said and it is a great test for the memory.’

  ‘Crane speaks truth?’ Thomas asked.

  ‘What is truth?’ Galphus replied. ‘If you mean he presented the facts then it would be correct. He never sold you to me. I took you. Took you because I wanted to. It was Smutt who fell from the tower – sent to fly by a Druggle – how exciting.’

  ‘Now you have us what will be done?’ Crane asked, all forlorn.

  ‘Your fate is not yet decided. I know a man who would like to see Thomas again and someone is on their way to take him to Whitby. You, my friend …’ Galphus sighed. ‘As for Kate, her fate is sealed with mine and she will stay. Tell me, Jacob. You’re a man who always has loved power. How does it feel for it now to be such vainglory? You have the rest of the day to consider. At nightfall we will come for Kate and then she will set out upon her journey.’

  Blatherskite

  CHILDREN? Names?’ Ergott complained as Barghast held him by the neck and pushed him back in his seat of the carriage. ‘I don’t know their names.’

  ‘Then how will you find them?’ Raphah asked as the coach rolled slowly on.

  ‘With the dowsing rod – what else?’ Ergott grumbled as he folded away the map and slid the wand back into his pocket. ‘I don’t need a name to find a child, all I need is something that belongs to them.’

  ‘Then who employed you?’ Lady Tanville asked.

  ‘A friend of my uncle’s. Is that such a crime?’ Ergott sank back into the smoke-stained leather and frowned. ‘I am a dowser, I care not for who employs me.’

  ‘And who would that be?’ Barghast asked.

  ‘A priest,’ Ergott said in a matter-of-fact way as he took the pipe from his pocket.

  ‘Demurral?’ asked Raphah.

  ‘Could be. The name seems familiar. I am not sure if I can remember.’

  ‘Then let me be a lightning bolt to your memory.’ Barghast grizzled angrily. ‘Do you know where to look for the children?’

  ‘Why such an interest? It is as if you have a stake in my venture.’ Ergott lit his pipe to fumigate them from his presence.

  ‘And Bragg?’ Tanville asked.

  ‘He’s dead. You three saw to that and then covered your tracks. I would see a magistrate, were there one nearby, and have you all hanged. Capital offence – murder.’ Ergott was silent for a moment and looked at them as he blew purple smoke from the side of his mouth. ‘I was employed by Demurral and what of it? He asked me to find two urchins that had escaped his care. I had to bring them to Whitby and I would be paid. He said they were in the hands of a villain called Jacob Crane. Is that so important?’

  ‘We are satisfied by what you said,’ Tanville said in a serene voice. ‘We thought that you were a changeling and the one who killed Mister Shrume. Your answer was good enough for us not to believe that any more.’

  Lady Tanville nodded as she spoke and smiled politely as the carriage rocked from side to side. An uncomfortable silence fell upon the gathering that lasted for several miles.

  ‘Beadle drives well,’ Ergott said eventually to break the silence. No one replied. ‘London will be soon, within the hour at least,’ he said again, hoping to illicit an answer.

  ‘At least,’ said Lady Tanville as the carriage slowed upon the hill.

  Beadle drove on. The light of dawn breaking upon the Hampstead trees and the road that led across the heath. Ahead was the city that tugged upon the Great North Road, pulling them on. London came suddenly. Fields gave way to houses that soon surrounded one another. Already the streets were full of people making their way to the city. From east and west, those who had fled the sky-quake were returning slowly. Many pushed their handcarts filled with all they had, others drove carriages piled high with mattresses, vagabonds and crying children.

  Beadle had never seen anything like this before. He wiped the sweat from his brow as he pulled the horses on a cl
oser rein. They knew the journey and needed no encouragement. For the first time he could see the battered dome of St Paul’s, reaching to the sky like a broken egg. Far away, small fires spiralled columns of smoke into the cold morning air. Above the Thames a November mist clung to the water margin. Beadle began to sing tunelessly. He quickly forgot the night. The sight of Demurral faded, somehow the day brought no fear.

  Beadle allowed the horses to lead them on. He sat, wrapped in the coachman’s blanket, and wondered about his fate. Upon the mile, Raphah would call up to him as he asked his welfare. Each shared hope. In the morning light there was a hint of bitterness. Beadle didn’t want the journey to end. As the coach trundled down the Hampstead road, London lay before him. It was like he was journeying into a new world and all would be well.

  Eventually, as they drove through beaten streets of Camden and then Holborn, the horses stopped where they had always stopped. Beadle looked up at a cold grey building, its walls drab and scarred. The front of the coaching inn was peppered with marks from the comet and its torn thatch hung like an old hayrick. No one came to greet them. All was quiet; the street was empty but for the horse dung and several rogues who drank on the steps of the demolished church opposite the inn.

  Beadle jumped from the driving plate and opened the carriage door. About his shoulders he had the coachman’s jacket. Three sizes too big, it hung like a sack. He didn’t care – everyone could see that he had driven the coach. In due course a small woman peered around the door and looked at him suspiciously. She flaked the paint from the wood with her long fingers All Beadle could see was her one staring eye. The other was covered in a black patch strapped to her head so tightly that it looked like a ridge in her skin. She didn’t speak but examined each of them intently, as if she knew why they had arrived.

  Reluctantly she opened the door and gestured for Beadle to step closer. Beadle walked towards her as the others in the carriage watched.