by James Roy
Stelka closed her eyes then, and a moment later Tab felt her consciousness edging in alongside hers in the mind of Rat.›››Is Tab?
›››Yes it is››I have to tell you something, Stelka. I followed Fontagu, like you suggested
›››What did happen?
›››He agreed to do a play. He’s doing The Gimlet Eye
›››Very good story that one good choice
›››They took it away from him. They took his script
›››Who?
›››Do you know someone called Kalip Rendana?
She felt Stelka hesitate, but it wasn’t a hesitation that came of fear or uncertainty. It seemed to come of nothing more than Stelka thinking, turning the name over and over in her mind. Finally she had an answer.›››I not know Kalip Rendana
›››He works for Janus, who works for Florian
A shudder brushed past Tab’s awareness.›››He is bad man
›››Well yes, of course he is. We all hate Florian
Somehow, through her next thought, Tab could feel Stelka’s sudden flare of indignation.›››Not Florian. Janus is bad man
›››He only works for Florian
›››Janus only works for Janus
›››What should I do now?››They took Fontagu’s play
›››Do nothing››Wait and watch. You are magician
›››What’s that got to do with it?
›››Magician knows when to act. Go now. Not mind-talk too much for now
›››Are you all right?
›››Go now. Talk later. And be careful, friend Tab
Tab felt Stelka’s mind tear away like a piece of damp paper, and then she was alone in the mind of Rat.›››Thank you again, little friend
Tab pulled away, and opened her eyes to see the inside of her little bed-stall. She lay back and listened to Freya humming quietly to herself in the next stall. Do nothing, Stelka had said. The former Chief Magician had never tried to hide her dislike of Fontagu, and had often tried to warn Tab that getting too close to him could lead to trouble. So was she now encouraging Tab to sit back and let Fontagu’s nature lead him into the trouble that never seemed that far away?
Tab pursed her lips. How could she double-guess Stelka, who had nothing to gain from standing by and watching Fontagu destroy himself ? She couldn’t. She wouldn’t. Tab had very few options anyway, so she would do exactly what Stelka had suggested. Nothing could be achieved by marching into the palace and demanding answers. So she would do nothing, apart from waiting, and watching.
With these thoughts in her mind, and with the vortex-bells ringing high in the rigging, Tab pulled her blanket over herself and picked up her book.
A short time later, without too much fuss, the journey through the vortex had come and gone. It all happened fairly quickly, and was barely even violent enough to make her stop reading. Sometimes going through a vortex led to buildings and walls falling down, and occasionally animals and even people being injured, sometimes even bits of the rigging came down in the streets. A few weeks before an entire spar, as thick as a market lane was wide, had crashed down in the Thieves’ Quarter. Even though many joked that a piece of timber that size was the only thing that could have landed in that part of the city without fear of being stolen, the truth was that a couple of dozen people had been crushed to death. It was almost as if it was a reminder that vortexes weren’t a trivial matter. What was certain was that they were now a regular part of life in Quentaris.
But this one had been relatively gentle, little more than a rumble coming through Tab’s mattress, a couple of minutes of darkness, one or two bricks falling from a wall somewhere nearby, and a sudden pallid brightness which made Tab think of watered-down lightning. It was a relief. A gentler vortex meant less of a clean-up around the farm.
In the street that ran along the other side of the stable wall, Tab could hear excited voices and hurried footsteps. This was as much a part of travelling through a vortex as mixing up mortar for repairing walls. Nor’city Farm was quite close to the edge of the city, and every time Quentaris was taken through into another world, most Quentarans rushed to the edge to look down and see what kind of place they’d been taken to this time.
Quite frankly, Tab couldn’t be bothered. She was tired. Besides, she’d find out the next day, when everyone was talking about the colour of the land, whether it was mountainous or flat, dry or lush, populated or deserted. She’d find out, she’d be interested for a moment, and then she’d go back to not caring that much either way.
So for now, unless Bendo barged into her stall and insisted that she clean up some mess or another, she was going to stay right where she was, and she was going to sleep.
AMELIA HEARS A STORY
It was an empty world below Quentaris. It had been for days, ever since they arrived through the gentle vortex. Day upon day of endless ocean below, and overcast skies above, with a washed-out sun doing its best to cast its weak glow from beyond the thin cloud.
Tab leaned out over the edge of the parapet and looked down. Beside her, Philmon formed a huge blob of saliva between his lips. It grew and grew, and finally he pursed his lips and let it break free. It fell past the city wall, past the jutting rocks and soil where Quentaris had been torn away from its original site, and continued to pick up speed as it plummeted down towards the blue shimmer of the ocean far below. Then, long before it had even passed the bottom of the ‘keel’ of Quentaris, it was lost to their view.
‘You’re disgusting,’ Amelia said, but she giggled as a nearby sightseer tutted his disapproval.
‘It’s not like there’s anything down there for it to land on,’ Philmon replied. ‘It’s just a whole lot of water. Spit plus water equals more water.’
‘So, Philmon, what’s the word from up in the rigging?’ Tab asked. ‘It’s been fifteen days now…’
‘Eighteen,’ Amelia corrected her.
‘Is it that many? So, it’s been eighteen days since we arrived here, and nothing. No landing parties…’
‘There’s nothing to land on,’ Philmon said.
‘So why are we staying here? Couldn’t they call up a new vortex and go somewhere better?’
‘I wouldn’t know. They don’t tell me anything like that. I just work up there,’ Philmon replied.
‘I wasn’t trying to squeeze you for information,’ she said.
He smiled. ‘Yes you were.’
‘All right, I kind of was. But you don’t know anything?’
‘Not a thing.’
‘Maybe we’re staying here. Maybe Florian’s bored with being a pirate,’ Amelia said.
Tab frowned at her. ‘Don’t,’ she said. ‘What if someone hears you?’
‘I don’t care.’
‘Well you should care. They’ll chuck you in Skulum Gate with all the others. And me as well.’
‘You should be careful,’ Philmon agreed. He turned and looked at the tired sun, which was trying to shine through, and mostly failing. ‘I think I’m back on shift soon,’ he said. ‘It’s hard to say with that sun. It doesn’t behave like it should. Have you noticed how much shorter the days are?’
‘Maybe that’s why there’s been eighteen of them when I thought there were only fifteen,’ Tab mused.
‘No, that’s because you’re bored,’ Amelia said. ‘Come on, let’s go and see how Fontagu’s going with the play.’
‘Oh, that’s not fair!’ Philmon wailed. ‘I’ve got to go to work!’
‘Well have a great time,’ Tab said. ‘And see if you can find out anything.’
‘I’ll do what I can.’
While Philmon slouched off to work, the girls began the ten minute walk to the New Paragon playhouse. ‘I still don’t know what this stupid play’s about,’ Amelia said. ‘I know nothing about this story.’
‘You’re such a cultured thing, aren’t you?’ Tab replied, deciding not to tell Amelia that she’d slept through most of the one productio
n she’d seen. ‘You don’t know the story of The Gimlet Eye?’
Amelia shrugged. ‘Should I?’
‘Probably.’
‘So, tell me about it. And try to make it interesting.’
‘Well, it’s a bit of an old-fashioned story,’ Tab said.
‘You mean the language?’
‘Not just that. I mean yes, it is written with old-fashioned words, but the story’s pretty old as well. You know, with people mistaking girls for boys and boys for girls and snakes for worms and all that kind of carry-on. I can’t believe people used to fall for that sort of thing!’
‘People haven’t always been as smart as they are now,’ Amelia said.
‘I guess that’s true. Anyway, the story goes a bit like this: there’s this beastie roaming the mountains near a particular village. All the people who live in the village are getting terrified, because this beast – the Gimlet Eye, it’s called – is causing serious havoc. It starts out killing livestock, like horses and mules and sheep and goats and ducks and shickins and all sorts of things.
‘So the little… the commoners put up with this for a while, but eventually they’re starting to get fed up with having to lock all their animals away every night. But they’re not as fed up with the locked-up the animals away as the beastie is, and it starts taking unsuspecting people. Anyone alone in the fields, or in the woods, or sleeping rough, the Gimlet Eye takes them.’
‘Hang on, why’s it called the Gimlet Eye? What does that even mean?’
‘A gimlet is a really sharp little tool, kind of like a spike. It’s a bit like a very small hand-drill, I think.’
Amelia looked confused. ‘And the eye?’
‘I’m getting there,’ Tab said, with a tiny frustrated shake of her head. ‘The Eye kills people by waking them up, or getting their attention, then it takes on the form of a beautiful woman. And when I say beautiful, I mean the most beautiful woman you can imagine.’
Amelia sighed. ‘How did I know this was coming?’ she said, stepping around a dog that was scratching fleas in the middle of the street. ‘There’s always a beautiful woman who turns out to be the monster.’
‘Not always, but in this case, yes,’ Tab said, smiling. ‘So the Gimlet Eye takes on the form of a gorgeous woman, and when it’s got the attention of the man in question, it holds his attention, and of course he can’t move because he’s absolutely transfixed by its beauty. And while he’s transfixed, it gazes into his eyes, and cooks his brain.’
‘Through the eyes?’ Amelia asked breathlessly.
‘Exactly, through the eyes. And when the victim goes into this state of… of nothingness, the monster moves in and ung! – the man’s dead. One bite, there goes the head, chomp chomp chomp.’
‘Well, it sounds like a great story so far. A really fun play to take the whole family to.’
‘Oh yes, absolutely!’ Tab said with a laugh.
A seller from the nearby markets had just slouched by with his high-laden mule. ‘Hang on,’ Amelia said, ‘you just told me that this Gimlet Eye thing turns into a beautiful woman, right? So how does it transfigure -’
‘Transfix.’
‘Sorry, how does it transfix animals? Does it take the form of an especially lovely lady-goat or lady-donkey?’
‘No, I think for the animals it just goes ung! To be honest, the original text doesn’t really go into its methods of attracting livestock, Amelia.’
‘Sorry. I just thought it seemed like quite a major flaw in the story.’
Tab frowned at her. ‘And the fact that this creature can simmer your brains with a stare didn’t make you stop and think? Come on, Amelia, these old legends don’t care about that kind of thing. You shouldn’t get so technical.’
‘Very well, but there is one more thing,’ Amelia went on. ‘If this monster thing likes to turn itself into a gorgeous woman to lure its prey, who are always men, why don’t they just send the womenfolk of the village out to kill it?’
Tab stopped walking for a moment and stared at her. ‘I don’t know, all right? They just don’t! Should we carry on with the story?’
Amlia shrugged. ‘Sure, if you think it’s worth it.’
‘ Thank you. So, they decide to hunt this thing down, and there’s this one man in the village – a carpenter called Robar, but he’s quite poor, and not at all brave. He’s also lame, and has to use a stick when he walks, and he barely makes enough money to support himself, his wife and his little dog Fargus.’
‘Why doesn’t his wife get a job?’ Amelia asked.
Tab took a deep breath. ‘I don’t know, Amelia. She’s got no arms.’
Amelia’s eyes were suddenly wide. ‘Really? She’s got no arms?’
‘No! No, of course she has arms – I made that bit up. I don’t know why she doesn’t work, but she doesn’t. And neither does he, really, as I said, because he’s lame. And to make matters worse, he’s blind in one eye. He’s a bit of a mess, truth be told.’
‘Sad.’
‘It is.’
‘Hard, being a carpenter with only… Sorry. Continue.’
‘Thank you. So anyway, when the villagers decide that they’re going to hunt down this Gimlet Eye beastie, Robar says he wants to go along.’
‘With his walking stick?’
‘Exactly. And with his one good eye. And of course everyone in the village thinks that the very idea that he should go along on the hunt is totally hilarious, including his wife.’
‘Now that’s not very kind.’
‘Oh, his wife’s the worst of the lot! Her name is Sarad, and as well as not helping out with the income, she’s a first-rate… well, let’s just say that she’s not very nice. And she’s always ridiculing Robar, and saying that she wishes she’d married someone brave and strong like Darmas Girth, the local hunter, who thinks that he’s the big man in the village. Because the thing is, she’s actually quite in love with him.
‘Then Darmas Girth leads the hunting party out into the dark woods – without Robar – and they search for days, but can’t find the Eye. But one night, when they’re about to give up the search, the hunting party is sleeping out in the woods, near a creek of some kind, and Darmas Girth hears the sound of singing, and he wakes up to see a beautiful maiden bathing in the moonlight, singing softly to herself.’
‘Oh dear,’ Amelia sighed. ‘She’s naked, isn’t she?’
Tab smiled. ‘I’m afraid so.’
Amelia chuckled. ‘Men,’ she said.
‘It’s a fable, Amelia. So of course Darmas Girth can’t look away, he’s so captivated by her beauty, and he gets up from his place beside the fire and goes over there, and the beautiful woman turns around and yes, it’s the beastie, and it cooks his brain and eats his head.’
‘Nice,’ said Amelia. ‘Isn’t it? So all the other men wake up and hear this commotion, and luckily the Gimlet Eye is too busy eating Darmas Girth’s head to bother looking like a lovely woman any more, so they see it in all its horrible awfulness.’
‘Which is what? What’s it look like?’
Tab shrugged. ‘I’m not sure. It’s just… horrible.’
‘And awful?’
‘Yes, very. So the men all run away and go back to the village, and although they’re upset that Darmas Girth is dead – but only a bit upset, because even though he was strong and brave, he was also a bit of a bully – they’re more disappointed that they haven’t been able to kill the Gimlet Eye as they set out to do.’
‘Which means they’re going to have to keep locking their animals up at night.’
‘That’s right. But do you know who’s most upset about Darmas Girth getting his head eaten? Sarad, Robar’s wife. You see, she was secretly in love with him.’
‘It wasn’t that much of a secret,’ Amelia said. ‘You told me that just a minute ago.’
‘Well anyway, it’s a secret to everyone else, including Robar. And when he finds out that his wife is so grief-stricken at the news of Darmas Girth’s death, he decid
es to do something.’
‘Let me guess – he decides to go out and hunt the Gimlet Eye himself.’
‘Yes! Exactly!’ Tab replied. ‘How did you know?’
‘Just a hunch. But hang on – won’t he get his head eaten as well?’
Tab stopped walking and looked at Amelia, a sly smile on her lips. ‘He can only fall victim to the Gimlet Eye if he can see it, can’t he?’
‘I suppose so…’
‘And he’s already blind in one eye, isn’t he? So do you know what he does?’
‘Oh no,’ Amelia said, shaking her head. ‘He doesn’t!’
‘He does. He goes out into the woods with his walking stick and his trusty little dog Fargus, and in his pocket he has a small tool from his workshop – a tiny little hand-drill.’
‘A gimlet!’ said Amelia.
Tab nodded and smiled. ‘Exactly. And he hunts for the monster until one night he’s sitting by his campfire and he hears Fargus start woofing like mad. The dog’s going crazy, and sensing that he’s spotted the beastie, Robar takes out the gimlet from his pocket and…’ She paused, watching Amelia for a reaction.
They’d stopped walking, and were in the middle of the street, with people pushing past, walking around them, going about their daily errands. ‘What does he do with the gimlet?’ Amelia asked, her voice barely more than a whisper.
‘I don’t know,’ Tab replied. ‘That’s as far as I’ve read.’
‘No!’ cried Amelia. ‘You must know what happens!’
Tab grinned, and shook her head. ‘I’m afraid not,’ she said. ‘Sorry.’
‘You could have said that you didn’t know the ending to the story before you started telling it to me!’
Tab shrugged. ‘Yes, probably. Oh, look, we’re there,’ she added, peering up at the front wall and main door to the New Paragon.
The Unja guard at the front door was young and bored, so it was a very simple matter to distract him by ‘accidentally’ knocking over a water trough in the street, then sneaking into the playhouse while he was watching the ensuing havoc.