The Midnight Charter

by David Whitley

  ‘They killed him, you know…’

  The voice drifted across the gap between their cells. Mark sat up blearily, but Ghast still had his back to him. The old prisoner rarely seemed to care if anyone was listening.

  ‘They cut him up and sold him off, pound by pound,’ he muttered, scratching a thick line diagonally across his cell. ‘But they couldn’t stop him thinking, couldn’t pull apart his mind. Not if he hid it. As long as he knows where he put it…’

  He spun round, grinning at Mark. Mark shuddered. There was something wrong with that grin. It seemed too large for the drawn, hollow face.

  ‘He was always looking for the big ones, the ones who kept their knives sharp and clean. He knew where to look for them, among the lights, and the ladies, heads in the feast. But the little star and his shadow were too quick.’ He sank back towards the other wall. ‘Win some, lose some… Win some, lose some… The walls are only there if you let them be… The mind wanders free… free to buy with its eyes and sell its breaths…’

  Mark stared down at his bare feet, numb from the cold and bitten with fleas. Could he sell his mind? Why not? You could sell everything else. What else could he trade? Even the stench, which he had never minded back in the slums, repulsed him now, hanging on his breath and hair like the stink of failure.

  He shook his head, staring down at the band of pale skin on his ring finger, not touched by the previous summer’s sun. He couldn’t trade anything any more. Prisoners were not people. They did not have signet rings. He looked up and forced himself to listen to Ghast’s ramblings. He would not think about the past. Not today.

  ‘When is an end a beginning?’ Ghast continued to himself, scraping a circle on the far wall. ‘Always? Until the end of time? Never? Because every beginning is also an end. Or maybe sometimes. What do you think?’ He paused and laughed. ‘Always yes, sir. Meaning no. Or sometimes yes. Hide every meaning in the simplest words, why don’t you? You always did…’

  Mark stuffed his face inside a piece of old sacking, trying to block out the light. It was easier when he slept, because the time passed faster.

  He heard the rattle of the keys and the heavy footsteps of one of the jailers. Voices spoke just out of earshot, then there was another set of footsteps, quiet and purposeful.

  And the brisk tapping of a cane.

  Mark flung away the sacking, pulling himself to his feet. A figure in a long, black coat was studying Ghast.

  ‘Snutworth?’ Mark croaked. It had been a few days since he had last spoken.

  The figure turned.

  ‘Quite correct, Mr Mark.’

  Snutworth stood still, the little light there was in the prison slanting down to his face, forming deep shadows over his eyes, and glistening off the silver handle of his cane. There was a silence. Mark kept expecting him to break it, but instead he stood, looking at him.

  Finally, it was Mark who forced out more words. ‘Have they said when they’ll hear my case?’

  ‘More than that, sir, you have been tried in your absence,’ Snutworth said matter-of-factly, never changing the tone of his voice.

  Mark gripped the bars.

  ‘They can’t do that! What about my lawyer…?’

  ‘A lawyer was chosen for you. She pleaded your case most eloquently.’

  ‘But I should have been there!’ Mark shouted, as loud as he could in his weakened state. ‘Even Pauldron was allowed to be at his own trial…’

  ‘The law does not require the presence of the accused,’ Snutworth replied, his voice expressionless. ‘Not unless they are requested to appear by the prosecutors or the victims. I suspect Miss Lily wished to use the sergeant to illustrate her appeal. Prisoners have no rights.’

  ‘But… but…’ Mark’s voice faded. It was useless to shout at Snutworth. He had spent every day in his cell working out what he would say at the trial, and it had all been for nothing. There was only one question he could ask now.

  ‘And… the verdict?’ he said.

  ‘Guilty as charged.’

  Mark felt his hands slacken on the bars.

  ‘But… guilty of what?’ he cried, the words bursting out of him. ‘I didn’t do anything, not really, nothing that everyone else doesn’t do…’

  ‘There was a small matter of business malpractice,’ Snutworth spoke slowly, his eyes never moving, his hands resting lightly on his cane, ‘bribery and corruption. The twisting of astrological readings to benefit your allies. And then there was Miss Devine’s evidence on the issue of preventing the free sale of emotions. All of this would have been trivial were it not for a string of charges of attempting to alter contractual records – an offence against the Directory itself. The court declared itself surprised that you had the time for your crimes…’

  ‘I didn’t… I don’t understand…’

  Mark tried to gather his thoughts. Had he really done that? So many meetings, so many decisions to make and contracts to seal… contracts he had often barely read, but that Snutworth had assured him were in order…

  ‘As your worst crimes were against the Directory, it was decided that no reparation could be paid.’ Snutworth stepped forward, his eyes cold. ‘You have been declared property of the Directory. Perhaps when you are older they will make you work. Then again, there is so much paperwork. Sometimes prisoners are simply forgotten…’

  Mark sat down heavily.

  ‘They… they can’t do this… I swear, Snutworth, I never tried to cheat the Directory…’

  ‘They had the documents. All signed and sealed. The most damning were sealed on the day they arrested you, as I recall.’

  Mark gripped his head, trying to stem the rising wave of panic.

  ‘The tower… I’ll trade away the tower… I can buy myself back with it… You’ll deal with that for me…’

  ‘I certainly could,’ Snutworth mused.

  ‘Then we’ll find out who was fixing the documents, you’ll see. We’ll…’

  ‘I believe you miss my meaning. I said that I could do that. I did not indicate that I was going to.’

  Mark looked up. Snutworth loomed over him, the bars between them casting thick, black shadows.

  ‘Snutworth…’

  ‘Consider, boy. You have no family and no other servants but me. The state does not claim your property for your guilt.’ Snutworth smiled. ‘I have no intention of selling my tower in exchange for you. I would be considerably down on the deal.’

  Mark stared, feeling all his emotion drain away. He was vaguely aware of staring at Snutworth, of trying to speak, but he couldn’t. All he could see was Snutworth, handing him those documents to seal on the day they took him, and for weeks beforehand. Documents that were unlike any he had sealed before – so long and complex that he had barely glanced at them. Snutworth leaned closer.

  ‘Then there is your share of the businesses, really quite satisfactorily successful. I would have preferred to have waited for a better upturn, perhaps another few years or so, but… well –’ Snutworth gave the tiniest of shrugs – ‘the time was not of my choosing, only the method.’

  ‘Why?’ Mark began to say at last. His voice felt like it was coming from very far away. ‘I trusted you…’

  ‘Trust?’ Snutworth looked thoughtful, considering the word. ‘I regret to say that the going rate for trust is very low, despite its rarity. No demand, I fear. And if you looked to either of us for a source of this commodity, then honestly, the market was against you.’ Snutworth stepped to one side, casting an eye at Ghast shivering in his cell. ‘Or perhaps you assumed that our betrayals of our former masters were isolated events.’

  ‘That was different,’ Mark said, shakily pulling himself to his feet, his legs weak with dread. ‘They were going to use us…’

  ‘And so we used them, to take advantage of your blunt vocabulary. Or did you simply assume that they would disappear, happy, contented, but out of your life?’ Snutworth tutted. ‘Rarely the case, is it, sir?’

  Snutworth directed his
question at the scrabbling prisoner, still scratching his symbols on the wall. Mark followed his gaze.

  And then he recognized him. The fat had shrunk to hanging skin, the greasy perfumes to bodily stench. But the smile – the smile had been the same.

  ‘Prendergast…’ Mark murmured.

  The madman barely looked up, but Snutworth nodded.

  ‘The name reduced along with his stomach. Rather fitting, I feel.’ Snutworth turned back, a flash of triumph in his eyes. ‘So, if you are quite finished retreating from the moral high ground, I believe my business is concluded here, and I have rather a busy day. Preparations must be made for the wedding.’

  It took a while for Mark’s anguished mind to take in what Snutworth had said, but suddenly a chill ran through his whole body. He didn’t want to ask, but he couldn’t help it.

  ‘Wedding?’ he whispered.

  Snutworth nodded.

  ‘Everything goes to me, Mr Mark. Your possessions, your position… and your betrothed. Those contacts will serve me well and it is only right that a powerful man should have a wife. I think that Miss Cherubina will be far more satisfied with me than with a useless, filthy little boy.’

  Mark sprang forward, his mind clouded with a sudden rage. No reason, no horror, just a sudden urge to squeeze his hands round Snutworth’s neck. He clawed through the bars, as if he could push them out of their sockets with anger alone.

  There was an explosion of pain in his chest.

  Mark found himself lying on his back at the edge of his cell, his body pinned to the ground on the end of Snut-worth’s cane, thrust through the bars with icy efficiency. Snutworth’s eyes were hard and cold.

  ‘You can’t,’ Mark hissed painfully, finding it hard to breathe.

  ‘Your property is mine, Mr Mark, in its entirety,’ Snutworth replied with a twist of the cane.

  ‘At least let Cherubina go… You don’t need her.’

  ‘The daughter of the most successful orphanage matron in Agora?’ Snutworth mused, increasing the pressure. ‘I beg to differ.’

  ‘But, you don’t care about her… do you?’

  Snutworth laughed.

  ‘And you do, I suppose, boy? The arranged fiancée you could barely stomach visiting? No… it’s not that, is it?’ he said, leaning closer. ‘I wonder, do you want to save her from being sold off by her mother because you couldn’t save yourself? Or is it perhaps that after everything you’ve done, she was the only friend you thought you had left?’ Snutworth forced the tip of his cane a little harder into Mark’s chest. ‘Look at the star-gazer taken in by his own legend,’ he said. ‘Look at the child reaching for the skies, when all around him the real things, the solid things, everything that matters, are taken away. And no one will shed a tear, because he didn’t have the sense to stay in the mud, or the wisdom to look at the hands he chose to hold him high and guide his path.’ Snutworth’s mouth twitched into a thin, humourless smile. ‘Worth so much to everyone else, worthless to himself.’

  The pressure released and the cane slid back through the bars. Mark coughed, clutching at his aching chest, pulling the dirt of the cell floor out of his hair. When he looked up again, Snutworth was already closing the door to the cells behind him. Ghast watched him go.

  ‘The shadow and his imp, they cause mischief,’ he muttered, before going back to his scraping.

  Mark lay there shivering. He barely noticed the pain in his chest or the new rasp in his breathing. All the memories of his life at the tower that he had been trying to keep away had crowded to the front of his mind, forcing him to see them again, making him watch as Snutworth, with a word or a gesture, effortlessly pushed him in the direction he wanted. All his great decisions, all his success, down to the servant in black. In his mind, Snutworth rose up, not the icily calm man who had just left, but a demon, laughing, triumphing and dancing upon him, each thud of his hooves another spasm of pain in his chest.

  He slipped between waking and dreaming, never moving from the floor. He heard footsteps and voices. Dimly he saw that it was night, and then day, and then night again, and still the dreams attacked him. Snutworth cut off his legs and wanted to trade them away, but his father had rights to the left one and wasn’t selling. Cherubina wanted his hand as a wedding present. A shoal of fish swam through the air, a starfish leading the way, laughing as it sank into the muddy ground. A crowd danced around him, then rose up like a flock of birds and tore at his clothes, his hair, his face. He tried to run, but the city walls loomed up before him, topped with jagged teeth closing in, crushing him as he tried to struggle free, to claw his way out. Then he was back before his tower. But it was swaying, tilting in the breeze, ready to topple. He turned to escape, but Count Stelli held him fast in a clawed grasp and he couldn’t move. The Observatory plummeted down. He could see the telescope turning end over end.

  And a dark hand stopped it.

  Lily stood before him, her eyes pits of fire. He cried in pain as her gaze burned him. He felt his finery turn to ashes. She extended her hand, but she seemed further and further away.

  Mark reached out.

  His hand closed round the hand of a pale, red-haired girl.

  Mark blinked, his eyes blurry. He was lying on his back. He tried to move, but the girl pushed him back gently on to the straw pallet.

  ‘Hush,’ she said, rubbing his chest with a rag that smelled of something medicinal. ‘The fever’s broken but your bruise is still a little tender.’

  Mark stared. The dreadful visions were gone. The walls of the cell still rose about him, but now he saw that the door to the cell stood ajar. In the shadows beyond he could make out the jailer, standing guard, and a sleeping Ghast. He felt an old blanket wrapped round him, against the chilling draughts. He turned his attention back to the girl. She laid a cool hand on his forehead.

  ‘Back to normal,’ she remarked. ‘The doctor’s remedies are getting more effective every day.’

  Mark looked at her. There was something familiar in the turn of the nose, the shape of the eye. And now he could see that she was not quite as young as he had first thought. About his age.

  ‘How… how long…’

  ‘Three days. The fever broke last night,’ the girl said, bathing the bruises on his chest where Snutworth’s cane had dug deep. ‘It’s the last day of the month of Scorpio.’ She smiled. ‘Two years since your title day. You should have a celebration.’

  ‘How do you know when…’ Mark began. And then, in a flash, he recognized her. ‘You’re Gloria’s sister,’ he said, pulling back.

  She nodded.

  ‘That’s right. I’m Benedicta,’ she said. Her balm tingled, spreading a soothing feeling. ‘You missed Lily. She was here earlier, when you were asleep, but she has an important appointment today. She’s been every day since we found out…’

  ‘Benedicta, I –’ Mark stopped, looking into her gentle, open expression. He felt quite a different pain this time, but memories of his fevered dreams came back and he had to continue. ‘I’m sorry about your sister,’ he said. ‘I never wanted –’

  ‘Of course you didn’t.’ Benedicta cut him off. ‘Only a madman would have wanted it.’

  ‘But still…’ Mark struggled to speak. ‘I should have… I shouldn’t have…’

  He held out his hands and Benedicta nodded. So many things he could have done and hadn’t. So many ways he could have helped her and didn’t. It wasn’t worth counting them all. She understood. He could see it in her face. A sad smile hung there as she looked into the distance.

  ‘I told Lily that would be the first thing you said. She thought it would be about Mr Snutworth.’ She shrugged. ‘She can be severe sometimes. But I think she was hoping I’d be right. She believes in you, you know. Which with Lily’s standards is pretty impressive.’

  ‘I wish I did,’ Mark said, lying back down with his cheek on the cell floor. ‘It’s not worth much now, but… I’m sorry.’

  ‘I know,’ Benedicta said. She paused, putting the he
rbal balm away in the pockets of her apron. ‘I forgive you,’ she said.

  Mark twisted round, not noticing the fresh pain.

  ‘Why?’ he said.

  Benedicta brushed her hands on her apron.

  ‘Why not?’ she replied. ‘I believe you, and we can’t change what has already happened by blaming people.’ She leaned forward earnestly. ‘Don’t grudges only cause pain?’

  Mark stared at her. She sat in the filth and the despair of a prison cell beneath the receivers’ barracks and talked about forgiveness. He opened his mouth, expecting disbelief. That was what he felt. Benedicta’s expression stopped him. There was a hard look there, beneath the friendliness. And something else too, lost in the depths of her hazel eyes. It was almost desperation.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. And to his surprise, he found that he meant it.

  For one brief moment, he watched the smile that grew on her face and felt his own mouth twitching in response. Then he dropped his gaze to the ground.

  ‘Look… I appreciate this, I do, but… you don’t need to keep visiting. And thank Lily for coming too. She didn’t have to.’

  ‘If you think that, then you don’t know her at all,’ Benedicta said, getting up.

  Mark nodded. It felt sometimes as if they were destined to keep crossing each other’s path.

  ‘I suppose she wondered where I’d gone,’ Mark mused, ‘but I don’t know how she tracked me down here.’

  ‘She didn’t,’ Benedicta said.

  Mark looked up. Benedicta stood, leaning back on the bars. Behind her, the shadow of the jailer loomed. Mark sat up.

  ‘We didn’t even know you’d disappeared,’ Benedicta continued, ‘not until three days ago. By the time we found out, you were already ill.’ She walked past him, to stand in the shadows under the high, slitted window, through which a few beams of afternoon sun streamed across the cell. ‘Such a coincidence really. I was only coming to visit a friend who works here. I bumped into Mr Snutworth on the stairs.’ She stopped, twisting her fingers. ‘He married Miss Cherubina yesterday morning. I’m sorry.’ She paused and then half-smiled. ‘Laud refused to organize it. He won’t work for just anyone, you know.’