by Dan Davis
‘Where is the master smith?’ Cedd asked. ‘I must speak with him.’
‘Same place all decent folk are this time of night,’ the man said. ‘In bed.’ He pulled out the iron rod with his tongs and laid it and the tongs on a bench. ‘I’m a journeyman smith here. I’m up all night running things while he sleeps so you can speak to me. What’s the boy’s name?’
‘Keeper,’ said Cedd. ‘The boy’s name is Keeper and he was brought here very recently, not more than a day or two ago. Hand him over.’
The Journeyman smith wiped his hands on his apron, which was pitted and lined with scorch marks. ‘You know, those men what dropped the lad off told me other people might come looking for him,’ the smith reached onto the bench and picked up a large iron hammer with a long handle. ‘They told us plain as day that Cromwell’s enemies might sneak in to steal the lad away. They took lengths of chain and a muzzle and they told me to put him to work and keep him safe until they came back to pick him up again.’ He hefted the hammer onto his shoulder and rested it there.
Writer glanced at Pym, who was grinning as he pulled out a rolling pin from inside his rags. Cedd looked small and old beneath the powerful blacksmith.
‘Please,’ Writer said, stepping forward next to Cedd. ‘Keeper is my friend. He was taken from his home and brought here against his will. His best friend was also captured and I am sure both their hearts are breaking. Please could you let him go home with us?’
The smith said nothing for a moment. Writer noticed he had shiny skin on his hands and face from his many years of suffering scolds and burns. ‘You’re talking about the dragon,’ he said. ‘The boy’s friend is the dragon they got in a cage in the market.’
‘You know about the dragon?’ she said.
‘Course I do,’ the blacksmith said. ‘It’s all anyone’s been talking about. That stuff don’t interest me but the lad kept asking about a dragon so I went and had a look at it in that cage. There was hundreds of folk shouting and throwing stones. The dragon thrashing about against the bars, crying out in dragon talk.’ He cleared his throat. Writer thought she saw tears in his eyes but he wiped his face quickly, like he was embarrassed. ‘You getting the dragon out too?’ Writer nodded and he continued. ‘I told the boy his dragon was safe and well. I was too much a coward to tell it true. Follow me.’
He grabbed another tool from his bench, a long black chisel, and led them through the forge to a door at the rear.
‘Take him and go. If you get caught then I never did nothing, right?’
‘Thank you,’ Writer said to him. ‘Thank you for helping us.’
‘Ain’t helping you,’ the blacksmith said. ‘I’m helping the boy. But you’re welcome, sweetheart.’ As he left he glared at Cedd and Pym and handed them the hammer and the chisel. Cedd and Pym took them and sensibly said nothing to the blacksmith who glared down at them. Then they followed her through the doorway. It was dark inside the small room but she saw a bench along one wall with three boys sitting on stools at it with their backs to the door. Writer recognised the farthest boy.
‘Keeper,’ she cried.
He jumped from surprise, and spun round on his stool. He stared at her, disbelieving. ‘Writer?’
She ran over and hugged him. He hugged her in return. ‘I’m so happy we found you at last.’ She held him by the shoulders at arm’s length. He looked tired and confused. The last time she had seen him his cheeks had been rosy but now they were pale. At least his eyes still glowed like embers in the dark.
‘What are you doing here?’ he asked her.
‘We’ve come to rescue you,’ she said. On his bench she saw rows of boxes of musket balls and tools like tongs and pliers and metal files. The two other boys were staring at her with eyes wide and open mouths, their work frozen in their hands.
Keeper looked over her shoulder. ‘Who’s that with you? He said, squinting in the dark. ‘Is that...’ Keeper sat bolt-upright, his expression twisting in anger. ‘You,’ he said. ‘You’re the one who tried to take Burp in the Moon Forest.’
Pym held out his hands. ‘That was me, fair’s fair. But I’m a changed man, I’m here with the best of...’ he broke off and ducked as Keeper threw a handful of musket balls at him. They pinged off him and the brick wall behind and scattered everywhere over the floor.
Keeper pushed Writer aside like she weighed nothing and charged at Pym. ‘Where’s Burp?’ he shouted and was about to crash into Pym when he jerked to halt and fell to the ground amongst the musket balls.
There was a chain pulled taught attached to a manacle round Keeper’s ankle that ran to a ring fixed to the wall under the bench. The other two boys did not appear to be chained up.
‘Burp is fine,’ Writer said, lying. ‘Archer and Weaver are rescuing him right now. We’re taking you to meet them and all go back to the Vale together. This man is Cedd, he’s...’ she did not want to say he was an alchemist, not when these other boys were listening. ‘He’s helping us. Pym we rescued from prison so he could help us, too.’
‘That’s right, lad,’ Pym said, brandishing the blacksmith’s chisel and taking the hammer from Cedd.
‘Fine,’ Keeper said. ‘Now, you’ll need to strike the bolt right against the head of it.’
‘Oh, don’t you worry now, lad,’ Pym said, chuckling. ‘I done this before.’
They left the forge without speaking to anyone. The Journeyman blacksmith pretended he couldn’t see them. Outside the cold hit her like a bucket of water and she started shivering as they made their way north, away from the castle gate and down the hill towards the north city wall.
The castle grounds were quiet, and when the moon was behind clouds it was also dark. There were rows of defences; ditches and ramparts, cannon bastions on the corners. There were very few soldiers about and no one challenged them or even paid them any attention whatsoever. Eventually they got down to the postern gate in the north wall, breathing heavily from exertion and fear.
‘It is another of Winstanley’s men on guard at the gate,’ Cedd said with satisfaction and the young soldier greeted Cedd with a nod and then unlocked the small iron door in the city wall. He led them through the narrow space and out of Coalschester, then returned without a word and locked the door behind then. With a thrill, Writer realised that they had done it. They had rescued Keeper and escaped the city.
The River Colne gurgled and rushed over weir by a big mill near the gate but there were no other sounds to be heard and no sign of pursuit. Still, they followed the river westward as fast they could, with the city wall far to their left and the river running over on their right.
‘Hurry,’ she urged them. ‘We are late.’
Keeper was grimly silent. So different from the boy who had never stopped talking when they had escaped from Bede’s Tower and the Moon Forest. No doubt he would be himself again when reunited with the little dragon.
Writer was tired and cold and very worried when they trudged between the city wall and the river right up to the bridge outside the north gate. It was a stone-built, arched bridge high above them over the river, no doubt to let boats and barges through underneath where there was a small dockside and a cluster of quiet, dark boats moored. She could hear nothing of her friends who would be waiting for her but no doubt they were being quiet so as to not attract attention. They climbed the stairs from the river bank to the top of the bridge by the gate and when she got to the top she gasped.
There was no wagon.
No Archer.
No dragon.
What is Power?
‘Say that again?’ Archer asked the man called Lilly.
‘I am afraid they brought the dragon here and then they took it away to the Vale, young man,’ Lilly said. ‘Not very long ago.’
‘Typical,’ said Weaver, shaking her head. ‘Come on, Archer, let’s get after them. Come on, Stanley.’
‘Wait,’ Archer said. ‘Who are you?’ he asked Lilly.
‘No time for questions,’ Weaver said, alre
ady halfway back to the stairs.
‘We’re going after them but let’s ask this one a few questions first.’
Lilly looked at them, not saying or doing anything. Archer thought he seemed like he might give them some answers. He did not look happy.
‘Are you an alchemist?’ Archer asked him.
‘Oh dear me, no,’ Lilly said, looking horrified. ‘Of course not. All of the Alchemists still alive and not with King Charles are all locked up in the Tower.’
‘You look like one,’ Weaver said, as if she had seen more than two in her whole life.
‘I absolutely do not,’ Lilly said, and he seemed genuinely offended. ‘I am nothing like them. I even have a wife,’ he added, smirking and stroking his moustache with one finger.
‘So?’ Weaver said.
Archer was similarly confused.
Winstanley coughed. ‘Alchemists are not allowed to marry,’ he explained. ‘They cannot have children.’
‘How can you children not know that?’ Lilly asked, and then his long moustache drooped. ‘You... you are...’ he looked horrified. ‘You’re from Bede’s Vale.’
‘We are of the Vale,’ Archer admitted. ‘And the dragon is our friend. We came to get him back. So if you’re not an alchemist, what are you doing in an alchemist’s tower?’
‘This is Gilbert’s Tower,’ Lilly said. ‘Gilbert was Coalschester’s alchemist. But Cromwell put Gilbert to work in the Tower of London.’
‘That’s why the Alchemist Gilbert is not here,’ Archer said. ‘But why are you here? And why did they bring Burp all the way up here only to take him away again right away?’
‘I am an astrologer, young man,’ Lilly said, puffing his thin chest out for a moment only to look crestfallen when he saw Archer and Weaver did not understand. ‘Of course, you being savages from Bede’s Vale you would be unaware of such a sophisticated method for divining the future. My expertise enables me to analyse the motions of heavenly bodies and ascertain subsequent effects on actions here on earth.’
‘So... what’s his job?’ Weaver asked.
‘Erm...’ Archer said, looking at Winstanley.
‘He tells rich people what’s going to happen in the future,’ Winstanley explained, sighing. ‘Makes a lot of money by it, too, from what I hear.’
‘How dare you!’ Lilly said, pointing at Winstanley. ‘My skills are unique. My benefactors merely show their gratitude and appreciation.’
‘Your benefactors who were the King and the King’s men for many years. Aye, and the Queen, too,’ Winstanley said. ‘Your truly unique skills were in persuading Cromwell to keep you alive.’
Lilly took a breath and then smiled. ‘Ah, yes,’ he said. ‘Now that is very true.’
‘Wait, what are your powers?’ Weaver asked.
‘Sweet child,’ Lilly said. ‘You see, all sublunary affairs depend on superior causes so it is possible discover them by the configurations of the superior bodies discernible in the night sky.’ He gestured at the ceiling.
Archer had no idea. Weaver shrugged. ‘Oh, right.’
Lilly smiled, his moustache twitching upwards. ‘I observe the stars.’
Archer looked at the confusion of the pipes and wires running back and forth and crisscrossing under the ceiling. ‘You can’t see stars from in here.’
‘Quite right, young man,’ Lilly said. ‘Your powers of deductive reasoning are greater than those of our glorious leader Cromwell. Nevertheless, Gilbert has apparatus here, with certain tubes and lenses and apertures with which to do so and on that basis Cromwell commanded me to learn Gilbert’s secrets. And immediately share them with Cromwell, of course.’
‘If this Gilbert has secrets,’ Weaver said. ‘And this Cromwell has Gilbert. Then why don’t Cromwell just ask Gilbert?’
Lilly laughed, his moustache jerking about like squirrel’s tail. ‘Quite right, quite right.’ He wiped his eyes, still smiling. ‘Yes, yes, Cromwell’s cronies and the grandees have grilled old Gilbert, don’t you worry about that. Now he is down in London working on powering the automata. Yet here we have in this wealth of wonders, this plethora of apparatus. This pile of steaming rubbish.’ He kicked a brass orb that lay on the floor by his feet that spun off out of sight, clanking and banging against things. Lilly winced and hopped backwards, grimacing.
‘You do not know what you are doing,’ Winstanley suggested.
‘No,’ Lilly cried. ‘I have no idea what any of this does. But will they allow me to leave? They do not.’
‘So you are a prisoner,’ Winstanley said. ‘Cromwell did not kill you but neither will he free you.’
Lilly sighed. ‘Quite right,’ he said quietly. ‘Nor allow my wife to join me. She is a hostage, of course, though Cromwell would not name her so.’
‘They brought Burp to you because you’re supposed to know about alchemist stuff but you couldn’t help?’
‘The madman Hopkins and his brass-handed fiend and their savages hoisted that terrible beast up in the lift without even thinking to ask me first. Flaming idiots. I’d have saved them the bother. I have no idea how to draw power from a dragon.’
Archer felt like he’d been kicked in the backside. ‘They wanted you draw power from Burp?’ Archer asked. ‘What does that mean?’
‘I have only the faintest of ideas,’ Lilly said. ‘Gilbert’s journals and writings are confusing, even after deciphering. But he often likens power to water and speaks of drawing it from certain sources as one draws water from a well. In fact, this entire tower was built to Gilbert’s specifications. You will no doubt have seen the copper rods sticking up from the roof of this tower?’
‘No,’ Archer said.
‘You surely cannot have missed the copper roof? The copper which was once a bright bronze has corroded into mottled green. The entire tower is actually a device in itself, for drawing power from the very air.’
‘What sort of power?’ Weaver said. ‘Magic power?’
‘Power from the natural world, my dear,’ Lilly said, airily, wafting a hand before him. ‘From the aether, from the heavens, from the very winds.’
‘You don’t know, do you,’ Weaver said.
‘Lightning,’ Winstanley said. ‘Everyone saw lightning striking the tower a hundred times every storm. What does that have to do with the dragon?’
‘The lightning is somehow funnelled into these great coils above us here and then slowly gathered into these enormous glass jars through the action of those chains over there, possibly, and there it stays for some length of time, perhaps. When you pull on these levers here the power flows through these copper pipes out to these devices here.’
‘And what do they do?’ Archer asked.
Lilly looked down. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Burp doesn’t have anything to do with lightning,’ Weaver said. ‘He breaths fire. Why bring him here?’
‘They had a letter,’ Lilly said. ‘A letter from Dee himself. Do you know the Lord High Alchemist?’ Archer and Weaver shook their heads, although Archer thought it sounded familiar. ‘The position is to all intents and purposes the King’s Alchemist and is the head of the Alchemist’s Guild. For something like a hundred and fifty years this man has been the Alchemist Dee. Dee was of course one of the King’s men but, idiot that he was, managed to get himself captured at the battle of Edgehill.’ Lilly chuckled to himself. ‘And Cromwell threw the man back into the Tower of London, which was Dee’s tower anyway, and put him to work building some sort of Device. Some say it is designed to kill the King from afar, from another country even. Others say the Device will make Parliament itself indestructible. Others that is it builds automata shaped like men and powered by demons who will fight the wars without any -’
‘No one knows what they are truly doing,’ Winstanley said to Archer.
Lilly coughed. ‘Anyway, it seems Dee wrote to Hopkins telling how Bede harnesses the power of his dragon in order to maintain certain spells of protection about the Vale. Dee ordered that they attempt to co
llect the power using Gilbert’s devices here. I have been summarising the workings of these devices and sending reports, descriptions and drawings of it all to Dee, at the instruction of Cromwell. And so Dee described precisely what Hopkins should attempt with the dragon.’
‘What did you do to him?’ Archer said, feeling himself filling with anger.
‘Stearne forced me to. He threatened me.’
‘What did you do?’ Archer asked again, the cold anger had hold of his heart now.
‘It was Stearne,’ Lilly said, almost in a wail. ‘He thrust the intake tube through the bars into the dragon’s back, under the scales into his flesh. The beast thrashed terribly but could not get away.’ Lilly had tears running into his moustache. ‘It did not work. There was no power. At Hopkins’ instruction they held the copper pipes against my head. Stearne was laughing when he pulled the leavers there. No lightning struck my head. Hopkins and Stearne were angry. Dee’s next instructions were that should this attempt not succeed they were to carry the dragon back to Bede’s Tower and there to gain entry to the tower. Even though they now possess Bede’s Codex, Dee seemed to think the key for unlocking all of Bede’s secrets lay in the dragon.’
‘Winstanley,’ Archer said. ‘Thanks for all your help and if you don’t mind we’ll take your wagon to rescue Burp. We’ll have to stop them on the road and there’ll be a fight.’
‘I’ll come with you, lad, I don’t give up on…’ Winstanley started to answer but Lilly cut him off.
‘Stop Hopkins on the road? But they are travelling with the entire garrison.’
‘How many soldiers is that?’ Archer asked.
Six hundred?’ Winstanley said, his face turning grey-green. ‘And horse. But why would they need so many? If the dragon is in chains and cages, what threat could warrant such protection?’
Lilly hesitated. ‘I am afraid their intention is to take complete control of the Vale.’
‘Take control,’ Archer said, cold gripping his heart. He thought of his parents. His brothers and his sisters. His aunts and uncles. Everyone he loved. Everything he knew.