Rotherweird

by Andrew Caldecott

  ‘Who from?’ asked Jones.

  ‘Anonymous – stupid,’ whispered Boris.

  ‘It looked like Flask’s writing,’ said Oblong. ‘Uncommonly like.’

  Ferensen again had the uncomfortable feeling he was missing something, but Valourhand offered an insight. ‘Flask played the fool when he wasn’t. He was a proper historian – which is why he found out more in a few months than the rest of us have in years.’

  The intervention prompted Ferensen to give Valourhand the floor. Apart from her class, this was the closest she had come to addressing a group of people since the Slickstone party. She did not do small talk – no introduction, no words of welcome, no thanks for her rescue – but instead she delivered a blunt report on the meeting’s scant progress to date. Even Salt responded to her directness by sitting up and putting down his glass.

  ‘There’s no use in data without analysis. Let’s start with the spiderwoman. The thorax was complete without sutures or joins. So too were the eyes, feet and other visible parts. So this is no Frankenstein, nor, I think we may safely assume, the product of a passionate encounter between a giant arachnid and a human. Nor could any creature evolve into a spiderwoman who speaks English and has an interest in French cuisine. Conclusion: the creature resulted from a process that only Lost Acre offers. Such a devilish potential for playing with Nature would explain why Rotherweird is kept both from the rest of England and its own past.’

  The reason of her argument held the floor as the blizzard of strange facts began to cohere. There was more to come. Without knowing it, Valourhand revealed a sensitive side. ‘As we were escaping, the creature could have caught and killed me, but it didn’t. There was a moment of divided personality, a fight between violence and restraint – indeed, I would say a fight between the bestial and the human.’

  Ferensen felt a mix of horror and relief: if the human side could still fight, there might yet be hope.

  ‘The animal I tried to rescue showed no restraint, but also had a command of English,’ Orelia added, before explaining her near-fatal encounter with the cat with fiery feet, its vain enquiry about an unspecified book, its English speech – and its desire to kill her. ‘A spiderwoman and a catboy appear to be products of the same process. What is interesting,’ she added, ‘is that the cat called me child, which clearly I am not.’

  Ferensen clenched the table. Interest in the book suggested someone who already knew about the experiments, the mixing-

  point and what it could do – and aspired to start again. Sir Veronal? Or might it be another player, as yet unknown?

  ‘The spiderwoman called me “girl”,’ added Valourhand.

  ‘It didn’t call me anything,’ muttered Gorhambury glumly into his beer.

  Valourhand found herself enjoying her interchanges with these strangers. They had a common cause, which she was only beginning to grasp, but it felt like a good cause.

  ‘If we’re so young, these creatures must be bloody ancient – like Ferensen!’ added Jones.

  Valourhand wondered whether the gymnast was quite as slow as she had previously thought. There were hidden layers there too. She resumed her analysis. ‘I come to the curious question of the doors into Lost Acre. There are two, which apparently do not work at the same time. The white has been open for years. Suddenly it closes in favour of the black, where any visitors must pass a formidable guardian. So who – or what – closed the white door? And why?’

  ‘Nature closed it,’ grumbled Salt. ‘As I said – if you were listening –

  Lost Acre is under threat.’

  ‘You mean the underground door is an escape-hatch for monsters,’ said Gregorius Jones, puffing his chest with excitement.

  Boris brought a more political perspective. ‘It’s not monsters we should be worried about, it’s what follows them. With that kind of trouble there’d be outsiders all over us.’

  There followed a string of Rotherweird pet hates, all beginning with P:

  ‘Politicians—’

  ‘Press—’

  ‘Police—’

  ‘Pundits—’

  ‘And we can say goodbye to independence.’

  ‘High stakes indeed,’ added Ferensen.

  ‘The stones must have a role in all of this,’ interjected Valourhand, but Oblong was no longer listening. He had solved the Valourhand puzzle: the more he looked and listened, the more striking the resemblance to Cecily Sheridan became. He assumed they must be contrary twins, one literary and warm, the other cold and scientific, and both with a sense of adventure.

  Orelia watched Oblong watching Valourhand. It was most peculiar: he looked besotted and puzzled at the same time. She decided to play her last card. No time for secrets, no time to play like Salt. ‘I think so too. A tapestry hung in the Manor before Sir Veronal moved in – I’ve seen it. There was a good man in the Manor who was killed, which would explain why the house was sealed off. There’s a section with monsters in cages, mixes of man and animal. The cages have dots of colour on their sides. Perhaps the stones helped create these monstrosities.’

  ‘Are you saying the mixing-point can be controlled?’ asked Salt.

  ‘What’s the mixing-point?’ asked Valourhand.

  Ferensen made his first substantive contribution. ‘It’s a place in Lost Acre where species mix and match. A slippery patch of sky, which can be reached and could in theory be used . . . and abused.’

  Marmion Finch stood up, scratched his ear, polished his nose with the outside of his little finger and cleared his throat. ‘Point of order, Mr Ferensen. You discuss the present, but you cannot begin to grasp it, and the future it holds, without reliving the past.’ He took a rolled-up piece of paper from his pocket. ‘This is the section of the Rotherweird Statute that binds me—’

  ‘Mr Finch!’ spluttered Gorhambury, appalled, and he was not alone: everyone knew their exemption from national government had been enshrined in an old and secret law, which it was a grave offence to discuss.

  ‘Back in your box, Mr Gorhambury, history must out. The Rotherweird Statute has a preamble: “Records shall be kept of all matters pertaining to Lost Acre, lest, should its secret ever emerge again, the evils can be understood, proven and scotched. Their Keeper shall be a single Herald sworn to secrecy on pain of death.” And from Section 3: “Any display or use or manufacture of The Dark Devices as hitherto fashioned and designed in the Manor of Rotherweird is forbidden on pain of death. On like penalty the creatures there depicted shall not be used on any crest, shield or other heraldic device by any person within Her Majesty’s dominions”.’

  ‘What creatures?’ asked Bert.

  ‘Which Majesty?’ asked Boris.

  ‘Elizabeth I of England,’ replied Finch.

  Vixen Valourhand asked a more chilling question. ‘Creatures like a cat with fiery feet? Or a spiderwoman?’

  The Herald did not answer directly. His audience were beginning to realise he rarely answered any question directly. ‘I hold a record of these forbidden animals. I would like to show you, but only on your oath of absolute secrecy – hands?’

  Orelia raised a hand. One by one the others followed, Gorhambury last. Unanimity.

  ‘Follow your Herald!’ cried Finch, and brandishing a Polk-tube, he disappeared behind the barrel through an archway between a row of rough-hewn columns.

  With Ferensen and Valourhand, who produced their own tubes, at front and rear, the company set off in pursuit, through archway after archway.

  5

  Escutcheon Place

  Sometimes the road ran straight and all three lights could be seen; at other times it twisted so deviously that those in the middle found themselves immersed in darkness. Ferensen had never known this subterranean Rotherweird; now, a student of mazes, he admired how often the wrong way looked inviting and the true way insignificant. He picked up the tiny carvings of flowers that marked the Herald’s route – Druids’ work, surely.

  Gorhambury kept to the rear, his mind awash wit
h the reams of legal provisions they were breaching – the History Regulations, the Subterranean Tunnel Regulations, the Escutcheon Place Regulations, the Countrysider in Town Regulations, to name but a few. He did not doubt their essential wisdom, but clearly the legislature needed to fashion an exemption for actions in the public interest. At the same time he worried about the scope for abuse of such a provision. He worried even more about where this particular appeal to the public interest was leading them.

  In front of him a whispered conversation struck up. Oblong sidled up to Vixen Valourhand. ‘I say, do you have a twin sister?’

  ‘I hope you’re not referring to the immensely tedious do-gooder Cecily.’

  ‘She’s awfully well read.’

  ‘She’s a pain in the butt.’

  Gregorius Jones, fearless of heights, suffered in subterranean darkness. ‘This is all a bit constricted,’ he stammered. ‘And stop crab-walking, Polk.’

  ‘Think of it as an adventure,’ replied Boris breezily, ‘good for the CV and impressing the fair sex.’

  Gregorius cheered up. ‘Finch had better right that stoop or he’ll be a wizened dwarf in five years. He should take up Pilates.’

  Orelia kept her peace. She wanted vengeance for her aunt’s death, and understanding. Both required the production of hard evidence, and if that meant unravelling the secrets of Escutcheon Place, so be it.

  Seething with resentment, Salt also spoke to nobody. All these nonentities were discussing his world as if it were their own. He had to find a way to save Lost Acre and then close it to all but himself. The party had focused on abuse of the mixing-point long ago, but the rescue of Lost Acre now was the true priority. Oblong’s bizarre reference to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’s entry of 1017 surely mattered: All were saved by the Green Man and the Hammer. Salvation –

  that was the goal. The weaselman had said that someone must come when the time is right – or ripe. That someone had to be him. Salt the gardener could surely play the Green Man.

  After some forty minutes Finch stopped and pushed up a flagstone in the ceiling. They climbed into a cellar and then followed Finch up and across a landing, down two passages, up a further shorter flight of stairs and into the magnificent archivoire.

  Here slow candles were burning. Off a central aisle six open bays with bookshelves rising from waist-height to the ceiling had cavernous cupboards beneath. Wooden busts of Rotherweird notables from long ago looked down. Books, the majority of great age, ranged from the monumentally large to the ridiculously small.

  Overawed, the company stared round in silence until Finch summoned them to a table in the centre of the room, on which lay a large volume, strikingly bound in black, entitled The Dark Devices. Despite the size, there were few pages. The title had been removed despite the beautiful spine. The letters MDLXXI appeared at the bottom. Finch opened the front cover, blank save for the following in small, faded writing:

  This book contains The Dark Devices as de∫igned by Geryon Wynter and his di∫ciples. It was fa∫hioned at Rotherweird and found at the Manor there. Its u∫e or di∫tribution is prohibited by law, and pre∫erved only to en∫ure that this law is ob∫erved and its ju∫tification under∫tood.

  Sir Robert Oxenbridge

  An intricate armorial miscellany held within a circle filled the next page – feet, talons, fantastic heads, hairy legs, winged bodies, armoured beaks, eyes and leathery wings. The colours shone, untouched by time. Inspired draftsmanship brought out the different textures and every detail.

  Over the circle curled the single word ELEUSIANS in red and gold. The four corners of the page also held a single circle, coloured but empty – one red, one blue, one white, one brown.

  ‘They look like the stones,’ said Orelia.

  ‘Who or what were the Eleusians?’ asked Gorhambury.

  Oblong had barely said a word. Here surely was his chance to impress. He put on his most authoritative voice. ‘The Eleusinian Mysteries were ancient Greek initiation ceremonies, practised by the cult of Demeter and Persephone. The name of the town, Eleusis, probably derives from Elysium or Paradise.’

  The majority looked at Oblong as if he were mad – only an outsider could harbour the notion that the Ancient Greeks, faraway history before 1800, could possibly help.

  Ferensen interrupted gently, ‘They were in fact ten children of brilliance who found their way here. Wynter gave them this name to foster the sense of a secret society.’ He paused. ‘It’s likely that their genes live on in Rotherweird.’

  Finch nodded in tacit agreement.

  ‘When did they come?’ asked Jones, as ever, puzzled.

  ‘1558. There was the Manor and the North Tower then – a church, a great barn, a few cottages and orchards, a single wooden bridge.’

  Orelia focused on the mysterious countrysider. Ferensen had never come to town – yet he and the Herald had formed an instant and deep understanding. They appeared to know about each other. The source of Finch’s knowledge would be the records, but Ferensen’s?

  ‘Keep going, Finchy,’ cried Boris.

  Finch turned the page again, and they craned over the table as he rotated the book. At the top of the page the word Magister curved over a single quartered shield, larger than the rest. In one quarter stood three creatures, each clasping a grey shawl about its face. In the centre of the shield were the familiar four circles from the previous page, within a larger, brown circle.

  ‘The arms of Geryon Wynter,’ announced Finch.

  ‘Who's he?’ asked Gregorius Jones.

  ‘He’s the man who set up this dark order of chivalry.’

  ‘And who’s below him?’ inquired Boris.

  ‘I don’t know – the names have been removed with acid, so there’s no trace.’

  Twelve smaller shields followed on the next page, nine decorated and three at the end blank. There had been names, but only the three below the empty shields survived – Hieronymus Seer, Morval Seer and Thibo Fortemain. Nobody said anything, but everyone (except Gregorius Jones, who had no knowledge of French) cast a surreptitious look at Valourhand.

  ‘Okay, I get it: Fortemain and Valourhand. So one of my forbears joined with this criminal Wynter. No surprise there; I always knew I had bad blood.’

  ‘Told you!’ cried Salt triumphantly. ‘You’re dabbling in what you don’t understand.’ Ferensen tapped the table.

  ‘Actually it’s you who doesn’t understand. The blank shields belong to the three who resisted Wynter: he refused them arms because they refused to use the mixing-point. Miss Roc was right. You lift your ingredients in a cage into the mixing-point, and out again. Your stones, Hayman Salt, controlled the outcome. Each fixed on one side of a cage; different positions produced different results.’ Ferensen, usually a model of moderation and fairness, for once uttered a rebuke: Salt had been too surly for too long. ‘You should have told me of their return – before, not after the sale.’

  Salt felt sick. He had as good as handed the stones to Slickstone on a plate.

  ‘There were, I’m afraid, many preliminary experiments, often with terrible results, mostly inflicted on orphan children gathered first from outlying villages, later from London.’

  Again Finch turned the book round so all could see that each shield held a creature – a grotesque mix of animal and animal, or animal and bird, or animal and insect. Only one shield departed from this rule: the first on the second page, an armoured fist holding bolts of lightning, with a tiny weasel on the knuckle.

  ‘Oh God,’ muttered Valourhand. She saw a caged man in a thunderstorm, iron bars drawing the lightning, though she did not articulate the thought.

  ‘You can’t mean Slickstone inherited lightning hands?’ asked Boris.

  ‘No, not inherited. He chose to be his own monster. He acquired lightning in the mixing-point.’

  Orelia thought she now understood: the mixing-point conferred longevity, which explained Ferensen’s presence in Rotherweird Westwood in 1893 and his intimate knowle
dge of these events, as well as Slickstone’s survival.

  Valourhand saw another angle. ‘You said there were ten brilliant children. There are twelve small shields.’

  ‘There were two locals, conceived at the same time as the others,’ replied Ferensen.

  Orelia did not ask the obvious question because she no longer needed to; she now knew beyond doubt who Ferensen was. So, she suspected, did Finch.

  Finch turned over the final page to reveal a small, single shield boasting a cat with fiery feet, prompting a general intake of breath round the table. Past and present were fast converging.

  ‘That isn’t a likeness, that’s exact,’ said Orelia. ‘It’s the very creature I met an hour and a half ago.’

  ‘Creatures from the mixing-point must live on . . . and on,’ chipped in Valourhand.

  Orelia watched Valourhand, whom she barely knew, watching Ferensen. Clever girl, she thought, she’s on to him too.

  ‘But whose creature is it?’ asked Boris. ‘Whose shield is it?’

  Here too the owner’s name had been erased.

  ‘I wish I knew,’ replied Ferensen.

  However much Ferensen had been editing his contribution in his own interests as well as theirs, she took this answer to be entirely truthful.

  ‘What did the cat say again?’ asked Oblong, feeling left out.

  ‘“Do you have the book?” followed by, “Die, child” when I didn’t answer. Not a nice cat.’

  Valourhand intervened. ‘You don’t conduct experiments – at least successful ones – without recording them. There must be a record or a book or—’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ferensen, ‘there was a book. I saw it only once. It’s called The Roman Recipe Book.’

  ‘You’re having us on,’ giggled Boris Polk.

  ‘I’m afraid I’m not. For “Roman” read “Manor”.’ He had suppressed his memories for too long, and opening them up was causing him all manner of unexpected pain. He had seen this book once, when it was almost complete, and he had the chance to destroy it, but had wavered. The consequences seemed too uncertain. Now another memory surfaced, as disturbing as the rest. ‘Long ago I was shown this inscription: I was bound bearing mysterious recipes. It's in Wynter’s writing. Wynter liked anagrams, you see.’ He scribbled down the words bearing mysterious recipes and rearranged the letters, one by one, crossing them out as he did so. A new title emerged: Geryon’s Precise Bestiarium. Silence descended. ‘This book does indeed contain the successful experiments,’ Ferensen confirmed at last.