‘Shall we investigate?’ Jake asked.
Charlie stared at him, then turned to Topaz. ‘How long has he been working with us …?’ he asked. ‘All of three days, and now, apparently, he’s running the show.’
They disappeared down the passageway and into another huge chamber: this one was unoccupied and a good deal darker than the first. It took the agents a full minute to accustom their eyes to the gloom. Finally a repeating pattern of shapes came into focus.
‘What are those things?’ asked Topaz, unnerved by the strange atmosphere.
On either side, as far as the eye could see, was a series of rectangular containers such as you might find on a cargo ship. Each one was raised at least six feet above the ground on sturdy legs; from its base emerged a thick funnel that curved round into the wall.
‘You’re the tallest,’ said Charlie to Jake. ‘What are they made of?’
Jake went underneath one, reached up and rapped the bottom. ‘Wood,’ he whispered.
Jake’s knocks had started some kind of reaction. Charlie listened carefully. ‘It sounds as if there’s something alive in there.’
They all listened: from the container came a muffled scratching noise.
‘That crate has a crack in it,’ said Topaz, pointing to another container: there was indeed a narrow opening towards the top of the box.
‘I’ll look,’ said Jake bravely. He grinned at Charlie. ‘What’s the worst that could happen? It’s full of killer scorpions? Give me a leg up.’
‘I think I prefer the old, unassuming, I couldn’t-possibly-board-a-ship-without-my-aunt Jake,’ said Charlie, making a cradle with his hands and hoisting his friend upwards. ‘What about you, Topaz?’
‘Actually, I think Jake was always brave,’ said Topaz with a smile. ‘That’s what I like about him.’
Jake felt such a thrill of joy at this pronouncement that he shot up the outside of the container like a professional climber. He managed to clamber up so that his eyes were level with the crack.
‘Careful …’ warned Topaz. Jake was now a good twenty feet from the ground.
‘Can you see anything?’ asked Charlie.
‘I can smell something,’ replied Jake. ‘It smells like the pet shop in Lewisham that was closed down by the authorities. Hold on – I can get a bit closer.’ He put his hand into the crack and climbed further so that he could look down into the container.
There was a splintering sound, and a section of wood came away in his hand. He managed to balance himself by gripping the top of the structure. There was a sudden loud rumble from within. Jake could see an undulating blanket of shapes advancing towards him. Suddenly rats started pouring out of the opening, across his head and shoulders, and dropping to the floor below.
Jake was seized with choking terror. He hated rats at the best of times, but this was disgusting. Fat rats, with thick tails longer than their bodies, were scrabbling across his hair and face. He wanted to cry out, and needed every ounce of self-control to stop himself.
Topaz and Charlie could see a stream of rodents heading towards the passageway they’d come from.
‘We’ll be discovered,’ Charlie whispered. ‘Plug up the hole now!’
Jake tried to replace the broken piece of timber, but the tide was unstoppable. More and more rats spilled out. A long hairless tail flicked into his mouth – he could feel it against his tongue. Then a rat slipped right down Jake’s neck, inside his shirt. It struggled to claw and bite its way out.
Jake could contain his revulsion no longer. Suddenly he lost control. He gave a blood-curdling yell and dropped to the floor; the rats continued to shower down on him and he screamed again.
From the other side of the room, Topaz heard the sound of rushing feet; then a group of guards burst in, approaching them with swords drawn. They soon surrounded the agents, who had no choice but to drop their own weapons and put up their hands.
‘I’m sorry – I’m so sorry,’ Jake muttered to the others. He was overcome with shame.
‘Don’t worry: adrenaline does that sometimes,’ said Topaz kindly. ‘It happens to the best of us.’
The words were of little comfort to Jake. He was painfully aware that he might have ruined everything.
Mina Schlitz strode into the room, and pushed through the guards until she was facing the three of them. Behind her the rats were still dropping from the hole in the container. The guards shrank away from them, but Mina did not flinch. In fact, when one rodent took an interest in her feet, she flipped it over, under her shoe, and, without even looking, stabbed it with her heel.
She studied Jake’s face. His beard was coming away and she ripped it off. This hurt a good deal, but Jake decided he would rather die than reveal either pain or fear again. Mina glared at Charlie. Charlie attempted to glare just as fiercely back. Finally she turned her attention to Topaz, and removed her headdress. First, she frowned as if in recognition. Then her eyes suddenly widened in astonishment.
‘Am I mistaken,’ she cried, ‘or might it be the one and only Topaz St Honoré?’
‘You managed to miss me in Venice,’ taunted Topaz, ‘so deuxième fois la chance, second time lucky.’
‘I never miss!’ hissed Mina. ‘Incompetence is as vile a notion to me as’ – she chose her word carefully – ‘mercy.’ Her composure returned. ‘Take them to Zeldt!’ she commanded.
25 BOOKS, RATS, CATACLYSM
THEY WERE LED up a back staircase into the castle above. The journey was made in unsettling silence. Soon they reached the large library of Zeldt’s private suite.
This was the same long room to which Nathan and Paolo had been summoned two days earlier, with its succession of fires, book shelves filled with ancient tomes, and Renaissance statues set in every shadowy recess.
Jake, Topaz and Charlie were pushed roughly onto chairs at one end of the long table. With a firm signal, one of the guards indicated that they should wait. To ensure their obedience, guards stood behind each of their seats. Zeldt’s throne at the other end was empty – for the moment.
‘Mr Drake will be worried beyond belief,’ whispered Charlie.
Topaz squeezed his hand. ‘He’ll be fine. He’s resourceful,’ she replied softly.
They waited in uncertain silence. Through the casement windows they saw the sun come up over the Rhine valley, the rays searing into their eyes. Occasionally one of them would turn round, only to be met by the steely gaze of the guards.
As the clock struck seven, two servants appeared with silver trays of food. Charlie, in particular, perked up in anticipation: all he had eaten in nearly twenty-four hours was a bowl of tepid cabbage soup.
Unfortunately the food was not for their consumption. It was set in front of the empty throne. Tantalizing wafts floated over in the direction of the prisoners.
The next arrival was a familiar-looking beast: Felson, the savage dog that had belonged to Von Bliecke. He strode down to the end of the table and, recognizing Jake’s scent, started to growl.
‘Long time no see,’ Jake offered mischievously.
Felson bared his teeth, but then heard another set of footsteps. He quickly retreated to the nearest fireplace, where he sat down, quivering.
Mina Schlitz stepped into the room. She ignored its occupants and went over to check the windows and fireplaces; she felt under the rim of the table and inspected the silver trays of food. Satisfied that all was well, she returned to the door and nodded a signal.
It was opened by an unseen guard and Prince Zeldt glided in.
It seemed to Jake as if the temperature had suddenly dropped – as if the prince emitted an invisible icy aura.
Zeldt also seemed to feel the cold. He pulled his fur cloak tightly around him and went over to one of the fireplaces. He carefully positioned his slim leather boot against a burning log and gave it a kick. New flames flickered into life.
The prince turned and stopped dead. Immediately, instinctively, his eye went to Topaz, and his lips curled into a malicious
smile. For her part, Topaz stared fixedly down the length of the table. Mina watched them both with interest. She took her snake out of its box, wrapped it around her forearm and stroked it under the chin.
Zeldt sat down on his throne, opened out a napkin on his lap and perused some papers while one of the servants served him with food.
Jake glared at him as he ate his breakfast with slow deliberation but little appetite. For Zeldt, eating was a vulgar chore. It was this, in part, that gave him such a pale, bloodless complexion. He put his plate to one side and poured a cup of weak jasmine tea, pursing his lips to take a sip, then replacing the cup carefully on its saucer.
‘At two o’clock this afternoon there is to be a solar eclipse,’ he said finally, in a voice so quiet that the others weren’t sure if it was directed at them. ‘Being trespassers in this corner of history, you are doubtless ignorant of the fact.’ He took another measured sip of tea.
‘Of course, I haven’t arranged it myself – that would be impressive; no, “the heavens” will provide it for free.’ Once again the prince’s eyes rested on Topaz, with what seemed to be a mixture of fascination and disgust. ‘An eclipse is one of the few things in history that can be depended upon absolutely.’
Charlie looked quizzically at Topaz and Jake.
‘Such a spectacle is always memorable, and no doubt the gullible masses will be quaking with fear,’ Zeldt continued in a monotone, ‘but I have a feeling that this eclipse will be more memorable than most.’
‘Where are my family?’ Jake found himself demanding. ‘My parents – where are they?’ he repeated, getting to his feet. The guard behind him immediately stepped forward, smacked him hard across the back of his head and pushed him down again. Topaz gave him a concerned sideways glance.
Zeldt calmly took another sip of tea. ‘What do any of you know of the Renaissance?’ Receiving no reply, he looked up and stared at them directly with his cold grey eyes. ‘I understand that the phrase is not in common parlance at this particular moment of time,’ he continued, ‘but that is neither here nor there. The Renaissance – what is your knowledge of it? You on the left,’ he said, pointing to Charlie.
‘The Renaissance …?’
Zeldt hissed with irritation. ‘Ignorant people. You, then, Topaz St Honoré,’ he sneered.
For a moment he and Topaz locked eyes. Then she looked away. ‘The Renaissance refers to a period of history,’ she replied matter-of-factly; ‘the present period – during which various classical doctrines and philosophies are rediscovered—’
‘Insipid!’ Zeldt silenced her with a snap of his fingers. ‘Do none of you have any character?’
Charlie reddened angrily as Zeldt stood up, went over to the fire beside him and kicked it again with his boot. Felson flinched, but dared not move from his position. The prince stared into the flames with his back to them.
A good three minutes passed before he sighed and went over to one of the bookcases. ‘The printed book …’ he said finally, brushing his pale hand along the shelves. ‘The invention of the century – of the millennium, perhaps.’ His expression soured. He pulled back the seemingly immovable bookcase to reveal, behind it, the entrance to a secret chamber. ‘Bring them,’ he whispered as he disappeared inside.
Jake, Topaz and Charlie were dragged to their feet and escorted through the doorway onto a stone bridge that looked down onto the catacombs where they had just been captured. Mina followed closely behind.
‘I believe you have already seen my printing press,’ Zeldt said, pointing into the space below. ‘Quite the stupidest and most dangerous device ever invented,’ he muttered. ‘Once only a handful of chosen people were endowed with knowledge. The printing press wishes to give know ledge to all … Enlightenment even to the slaves who wipe the stench from our gutters?’
His eyes darkened. ‘Enlightenment for everyone? Most repulsive of notions. What next? The beasts are enlightened too? The spiders and worms learn philosophy?’
‘If it’s so stupid and dangerous,’ asked Jake, ‘why do you have one?’
Zeldt smiled malevolently before answering. ‘Oh, I intend to give the people what they want for a little longer.’ His voice dropped. ‘Just long enough for them to … die. Come and see my laboratory.’
The prince led them across the bridge and into a large room filled with gleaming scientific apparatus: measures, test tubes, calibrators and square clocks with complicated dials. Technicians were at work here. In the centre of the chamber there was a room-within-a-room: a cube of thick glass where two further technicians, both dressed in protective armour, were engaged in some careful operation.
Zeldt led the others over to a table and picked up a large tome. ‘This is a copy of the book we are printing downstairs. The Book of Life, I’ve called it – which amuses me no end.’ He flicked through the crisp pages of newly printed gothic type and intricate illustrations. ‘It contains all the branches of new learning: science, astronomy, mineralogy and that most invisible of evils, mathematics. The book is a complete compendium of modern learning.’ His voice fell to a whisper. ‘But it also has a sting in its tail.’
An icy smile played across Mina’s face as he said this.
‘When the book is unlocked,’ Zeldt continued, ‘a surprise is revealed.’
The front of the tome was surmounted by an ornate golden lock with a key. With his fingertips Zeldt extracted a tiny glass vial from within the mechanism. He held it up to the light. His prisoners saw that it contained a viscous black liquid.
‘When the key is turned,’ the prince explained, ‘the glass vial will be snapped and its contents released.’
‘What are its contents?’ asked Charlie.
‘The fruits of many years’ hard work,’ replied Zeldt proudly.
He led them over to the plate-glass cube where the armoured technicians were working. Inside, a cabinet, also of plate glass, stood on an iron table. Here, using layers of pigs’ intestines as protective gloves, the two workers were distilling a quantity of that same black substance.
‘What is it?’ asked Topaz, almost afraid to know the answer.
‘You are witnessing a unique operation. The substance on the left,’ said Zeldt, indicating the contents of a small container, ‘is a paste of infected flea guts. It took a billion fleas harvested from a million rats to produce even that small amount of usable material.’
‘Rats …’ Charlie glanced at Jake.
‘The matter with which it is being combined’ – Zeldt pointed to the contents of another container – ‘is an ingenious agent that increases the efficacy of the other by at least a hundred times.’
Jake immediately recognized this as the substance in the second bottle that Talisman Kant had sold to Mina Schlitz: the honeycomb-like material.
‘Infected fleas?’ asked Charlie. ‘Infected with what?’
Zeldt couldn’t suppress a mischievous chuckle. ‘Oh, really. You must have guessed by now.’ Then the smile vanished from his face. ‘The plague.’
For a second all three of the agents stopped breathing.
Zeldt’s eyes glittered with the fervour of a true fanatic. ‘Yersinia pestis is the deadliest killer in history. In its first wave, medieval Europe was decimated: seventy million deaths. First fever, then vomiting, then agonizing, stinking boils, and finally blackened skin as death takes its grip. That was then. Thanks to the efforts of Talisman Kant, this edition – if you will pardon the pun – will be ten times more lethal. You shouldn’t stand too close. Those insatiable germs would love to get their teeth into you—’ He stopped mid-sentence. ‘But I was for-getting. You two meddlers’ – he nodded to Jake and Topaz – ‘are already protected with my antidote, my … What’s that vulgar word you use for it in the modern age? My vaccine. But please don’t worry.’ The prince addressed his last phrase solely to Jake. ‘I will find an equally revolting way for you to die.’
The three agents stared in horror as the technicians filled a number of minute glass vials with
the deadly black matter. These were sealed with a red-hot torch and transported to another workstation. Here they were inserted into the lock mechanism of the books, which were then packed into crates and, at the far end of the room, loaded into the back of an armoured carriage forged in blood-red iron.
‘In twenty minutes that carriage will leave here with five hundred of these books and head south. Over the next forty-eight hours every town and city in southern Europe will receive its free publication. Innsbruck will be the first port of call’ – Zeldt indicated it on a map that hung on the wall beside him – ‘then Milan, Verona, Genoa, Florence, and so on. The people will receive their gift in awe, they will wonder at its magic, ignorant of the fact that they have welcomed death itself into the heart of their communities.’ The prince’s eyes were now blazing. ‘Ignorant that anarchy will already be descending, decay already setting in. Ignorant that their meaningless lives will already be over.’
Mina Schlitz smiled gleefully at the thought of such delicious destruction.
‘So my books will eventually ensure the annihilation of Italy and all the arrogant countries of the Mediterranean – the worst criminals in the great fiasco of the Renaissance,’ Zeldt continued, ‘but the master stroke of my design, the prologue to my apocalypse, will begin, with a bang, this afternoon in northern Europe.’
He nodded at Mina, who produced a wooden box. She unfastened the latch, and from its padded lining lifted out a heavy golden contraption, placing it carefully on the table. It was a clock-like instrument comprised of tiny gleaming dials, levers and pulleys. On top of it was etched the same emblem of the snake and shield.
‘Such beautiful craftsmanship,’ Zeldt sighed. ‘It seems a pity that no one will be alive to appreciate it. Please – take a closer look,’ he instructed his prisoners, repeating with menace, ‘Take a closer look inside.’
Their attention had already been drawn to the curious inner workings of the device. Although it pained them to follow Zeldt’s orders, they leaned down and examined it more carefully. Encased in the heart of the machine lay a king-size vial of the same viscous black liquid. On either side of this, two miniature golden fists, each also engraved with the Zeldt symbol, were poised to strike and smash the bottle in two.
History Keepers 1: The Storm Begins Page 21