Last True World (Dica Series Book 3)

by Clive S. Johnson

  Nephril had to admit that the remaining masts somewhat destroyed the illusion, particularly the mizzen mast’s accusing finger. Cut rope even now lay coiled about its base.

  The whole incident had been an unfortunate distraction, one that had brought Mirabel’s Maturity Ball to a premature end. Nephril had secretly welcomed it, despite what it brought, for it had let him get away without unseemly haste. He’d returned to their lodgings and taken an infusion of popig to relieve the pain in his arm, so he could spend some time thinking.

  Penolith had mashed some nettle and even found honey, but by the time she’d taken it in to him he’d been fast asleep. And so he’d remained until the early hours, until a rare dawn chorus had teased him awake. In the mellow embrace of the popig and the pleasant company of the birds, he’d finally found the right frame of mind in which to think.

  By the time he’d despatched a message to the Steward, he’d just about got everything fairly straight in his mind. The morning had moved on by then, shooing the early birds to their daily chores and Nephril to the painful task of pulling on his coat. He’d stepped out into the pastel grey light of morn, quietly easing the door to behind him, leaving Penolith undisturbed, asleep in her bed, and set off down the street towards the Graywyse Defence and its steps down to the harbour.

  At each new flight, first the Herbengour and then the Passing Pool Pavilion would appear, its canvas roof once more a storm-tossed sea. The barquentine only really looked like a shark from the level of the quayside onto which Nephril eventually and doggedly stepped, painfully pushing himself on towards it. Its threatening stance, though, seemed to sap it of any real sadness, hid its deaths behind the fiction of a sharkskin hull. Only the morning seemed to mourn the loss it had carried, the air unusually still and damp and chill.

  Nephril had known nothing of the doomed voyage, of how his treasured ode had cast so many out onto such an unforgiving sea. It had been common knowledge abroad of course, but they’d spared him the upset of knowing. His first inkling had therefore truly been the sound of the barquentine’s unfortunate return.

  The Steward and his family were guests of the Harbourmaster at the Harbourmaster’s House, not much further along the quay. It wasn’t a house as such, more a series of rooms built into the very body of the Graywyse Defence and which now just happened to overlook the stricken vessel.

  Nephril found the only access to the house already waiting and so stepped gratefully into the lift’s cage and rang its bell. The cage soon lurched with the snatch of its rope, a counterbalance floor then descending towards him, its closely passing floor clearly stacked with sacks of ballast. They’d obviously overestimated his weight for he rapidly gained speed until the screech of a brake marked the lift’s slowing approach to the top. Jolting to a halt, he found himself standing before Melkin Mudark.

  “Good morning, Steward Melkin,” Nephril said through the grille of the cage, noticing a hint of suspicion lingering in the steward’s eyes, “and how is Mirabel today?”

  “Good morning, me Lord. Good to see you so well this morning.”

  Melkin slid the cage doors back and offered his hand. “She was fine last night but I haven’t seen her this morning. Bit early yet!” He shook Nephril’s hand congenially enough, raising sharp shooting pains in its arm but ones Nephril was already learning to expect.

  “Please, please come in and make yourself at home, Nephril. I’m sure you’ll not refuse a warm drink, especially against such a dank start.” Melkin hunched his shoulders and slapped his hands together as though warming them before turning and leading the way through into a cosy parlour.

  He closed the door against yet another day of unusually persistent cloud cover, the room’s golden glow and crackling log fire making it seem like Winter despite it being the middle of Summer. Melkin commented that he couldn’t quite remember when he’d last seen the sun.

  Two steaming mugs sat on a griddle within the hearth, close enough to the fire to keep them hot. Nephril’s ancient nose could just make out the tempting waft of elderflower tea, sweetened by sheep’s butter and plainly long infused. Globules of pale yellow fat skated around beneath the vapour, showing they’d recently been stirred.

  “Do be seated, Lord Nephril.” Melkin indicated an armchair nearest the fire and then reached down for one of the mugs. “This should ward off the unseasonal chill, me Lord.”

  He handed Nephril the drink before lifting the other as his own. “Perhaps an unconventional toast to my daughter, eh?” His grin was nervous. They both briefly raised token gestures but soon had the mugs to their lips, each slurping the hot brew to cool it.

  “So?” Nephril asked, “what be all this I hear about some new engine of thine, eh, Steward Melkin?” He hoped the use of the honorific would grate, the ensuing silence seeming to indicate it had. Melkin wouldn’t hold Nephril’s eyes, though, which struck him as odd.

  “Mirabel let slip thy worries about the forest,” Nephril persisted, finally drawing Melkin’s astute gaze. “Thine worries about the damage done to Nature’s own, hmm?”

  Melkin only coughed, uncertainly, leaving Nephril to add, “She told me of thy hopes ... hopes for a new power I think I am right in saying, a power not set so at odds with Nature.”

  At last, Melkin found his voice. “It’s ... it’s too much to ask. She shouldn’t have bothered you. It wasn’t fair.”

  “The Forest of Belforas is dear to me, dost thou know that, Melkin?”

  “Dear?”

  “Yes. The last vestige of Nature’s own true form, of her unbridled plenty, her natural balance - her last unblemished face.”

  The Steward seemed to perk up at this, absently took the poker from its stand and stabbed at the fire. Logs were unnecessarily settled, sparks billowing out before being drawn into the chimney. It was as though Nephril remembered those moments afresh, saw some of the sparks fall to the hearth and there wink out, their meagre spirits lofting as thin threads of smoke.

  He realised they’d not, not really, not outside his own mind, only within. He almost expected to find Storbanther when he turned his gaze to the other chair, surprised to see Melkin’s own plump face. The steward’s words, though, were more of a surprise.

  “I can’t go through with it, Nephril. It’s ignoble!” He looked genuinely distraught. “I know how strongly you feel about Leiyatel, the unintended evil she’s become. I’d be a fool to think...”

  “Young Melkin? Now listen to me.”

  “But...”

  “But nothing. I’ve thought long and hard. Not only since yesterday, but for many a year.”

  The distress in Melkin’s face turned to confusion, stifling his voice, leaving Nephril’s own to fill the air with its haunting mystery. “I have been Master of Ceremonies for a very long time.” He stared right through Melkin, as though seeing the past through a pane of glass.

  “I am certainly far too old now to remember how many thousands of years it has been, two without doubt but maybe more.” Despite a thin, sharp and angular face, Nephril took on a hangdog look. His sallow eyes dolefully stared in at their own memories, his gaze ambling through the vast warehouse of his mind, slowed only by the stoic refusal of the pain in his arm.

  “You are immensely wise, Lord Nephril, that I must respect, but I still worry so for my Bazarran brethren.”

  “Decline is overtaking us all, Melkin, I see that clearly enough, and so I also see the real fear it has borne. I see it because I feel it so intimately mine self.”

  “You’re fearful?” Incredulity lightened Melkin’s voice, as though he saw a jest, but Nephril only looked sadder.

  “Immensely so, Melkin, more so than thou couldst e’er imagine.” Nephril surprised Melkin by grabbing his sleeve. “I know fear far better than any man, so know thine own better than thou couldst ever know.” When Melkin only gaped at him, Nephril was undeterred. “I fear eternity, young Melkin, unending life, far more so than thine own fear of a life curtailed, but I also fear Nature’s greater loss.
”

  “But I have to contend with important and powerful members of the guilds right now, Nephril, ones who are already desperate. If they don’t see some hope, and soon, then my college will run foul of them, dragged into the dirt now littering our way.”

  “Then ‘tis plain thou need to assuage their doubts,” Nephril calmly ventured. “Need pacify the lion, eh?” Melkin only looked guardedly back, but was clearly still confused, thinking hard.

  Nephril sipped at his cooling tea, his teeth clenched against the fat. The sound of someone moving about above seeped into the silence. Nephril’s gaze absently lifted to the footfall, the clatter of a latch and the squeak of a hinge. A lady was about he was sure, moving to and fro upstairs.

  The steward also heard it, plainly undisturbed by Lambsplitter’s morning routine. His lady wife was up and about, poised to come down, no doubt ahead of Mirabel.

  “Steermaster Sconner was fortunate in having Mirabel close by,” Melkin said, seemingly out of the blue, to which Nephril looked bemused. “You know, on the quayside last night?”

  Nephril remained bemused until Melkin added, “Her ministrations? The help she afforded Steermaster Phaylan, you know, in aid of Sconner?”

  “Sconner? But...”

  “Yes. Although sorely ill, he lives on still. I thought you knew.”

  Nephril had certainly seen a corpse roped to the mizzen mast, or so he’d thought. He’d seen a man’s body cut free only to crumple lifelessly to the aft deck. “Sconner lives?” Melkin only nodded. “Then he clearly points up just how strong be Leiyatel still, even this far from her gaze.”

  A strong succour more’s the pity, Nephril thought. A condemning strength, one I can fainst avoid. His stomach sank as though from a fill of lead.

  He turned Melkin an almost crazed look. “Thou ask of me but eternal sufferance, young fellow, if thou didst but know. What price the way of Nature’s salvation, eh? What price!”

  A staircase somewhere beyond the parlour’s closed door compliantly creaked at some footfall or other, the tread of a foot upon a stair’s own tread. Nephril quaffed his tea in one - a thin, yellow stain of fat lingering along his grey upper lip.

  Along the mantelpiece, however, a few unobtrusive ornaments had begun to rattle; a porcelain lid tinkling upon its teapot belly, a spyglass stumbling back and forth without falling, a model sextant’s metal ring trilling thinly against its sightline.

  “They must have started trying to refloat the Herbengour,” Melkin dismissed, easily.

  Nephril rose and quickly wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Send Laytner to me, eh, Melkin? And soon, for I’ve a mind to aid thee.”

  Melkin stared at him, startled. “You’ll help, help remove what remains of Leiyatel?”

  “I said I’ve a mind to, no more than that. Send Laytner with an eye to thine engine granting an eternal forest its continued virginity, although it will cost me dearly of mine own everlasting damnation.”

  He’d nodded, curtly, and was already gone when the inner door opened and Lady Lambsplitter entered, her eyes sharply darting about the parlour. She nonchalantly asked after any visitors, ones so early in the day, but Melkin was too stunned to answer. He felt like an imbecile, unable to deliver the one piece of news his lady wife so earnestly desired.

  21 An Unsuitable Suitor

  Lady Lambsplitter watched Nephril’s almost bald pate fast receding along the quayside, his painful hobble lessened by the popig’s lasting blandishment. It didn’t slow him, though, and so made his retreat look all the more urgent.

  She was staring through the conservatory window, the room’s projection from the Graywyse Defence giving it a clear if somewhat elevated view of Nephril’s haste. He was now skirting the Herbengour’s bowsprit but it wasn’t long before he became obscured by the lift’s towering cage. Occasional glimpses of sandaled heels were still evident through its grille when Melkin Mudark came into the room.

  She turned from the window and stared at him. “Why wasn’t I told, and first thing ... when you knew he was coming?”

  Melkin looked pained. “It was Lord Nephril’s express wish that only I saw him.” He lamely held out a sheet of paper, its green seal plainly Nephril’s.

  “So, that’s why he was so early.” She turned back to the window and looked out again. “Why just you, though?”

  She saw a movement somewhere out within the pavilion and realised they were dismantling it. A section of canvas dropped away, revealing the mast upon which it had hung. Soon the boat below came into view, its deck overhung with the timber of the dance floor boards.

  Despite her mind racing, she couldn’t but marvel at the memory, see the previous night’s show brightly crowd her thoughts. Melkin had certainly impressed, had demonstrated his rare vision and skill. Even she’d been surprised at the impact - so many barges passing so perfectly between all those guests!

  “Well?” Lambsplitter eventually barked at Melkin. “What did he say?”

  Melkin’s words flowed smoothly, almost confidently, enough to hedge her doubt. They soon brought them to Nephril’s concern for the forest.

  “So, we were right then?”

  “Right, my dear?”

  “Oh! Nothing, Melkin ... dearest. Just something Mirabel and I were discussing.”

  “Well, whatever she said to him, it must’ve worked.”

  “Our daughter plainly did well, Melkin Mudark, very well indeed.” It was her first smile of the day. “Where is she, anyway?”

  “Oh, I thought I heard her about upstairs, my dear.”

  “Good. What did you agree with Nephril then, before he rushed off?”

  “Err, well ... he wants Laytner to attend him, at least in the first instance.”

  “Laytner? Why Laytner?”

  Melkin didn’t know, and Lambsplitter couldn’t guess, so her first smile soon faded. She then asked, “But he’ll do it, we’re certain of that?”

  “Well ... happen he will, just happen. I reckon so ... more than likely.”

  A waft of perfume came into the room; heady, rich, smooth. It stole Melkin’s words and most of his thoughts, but Lambsplitter only twitched her nose. “Mirabel? Is that you?”

  “Just popping out, mother. Won’t be long.”

  “Come in here now, do you hear? We need to talk.” She turned to Melkin and added, a little more softly, “Just the two of us.”

  “I’ll get on with catching up on a few things then,” Melkin said as he quickly withdrew, passing Mirabel on the way.

  “Where were you going, Mirabel?” Lambsplitter asked once Melkin had gone.

  “Erm, well, to see how the old steermaster is doing.”

  “Sconner? Why?”

  “Well...”

  “Never mind why, it doesn’t matter. As good a course as any. I’ll walk with you.”

  It only took a moment for Lambsplitter to get her coat - the new peajacket she’d picked up in Roagbank - and for them both soon to be enveloped in the whine of brakes as the lift lowered them to the quayside. Despite the screech putting her teeth on edge, Lambsplitter managed to draw the beginnings of a report from her daughter.

  She soon found corroboration for Melkin’s own report. When their conversation came to the forest’s salvation, not only Melkin but now Mirabel too made mention of a seeming sea-change in Nephril. It brought Lambsplitter the pleasure of her second smile of the day as she privately praised her own recollection.

  She’d been right in her memory of their journey to Nouwelm all those years ago. Nephril had plainly revered the Forest of Belforas, had seen its ancient presence as proof of Nature’s balance. He’d said as much then, and obviously believed it even more so now.

  Mirabel had by now rather half-heartedly led her mother towards the pavilion, the corner nearest still untouched by the demolition. Mirabel’s steps had become more reticent, although Lambsplitter didn’t notice, her thoughts elsewhere.

  “So, Mirabel? What of your other purpose? Despite it being cut short, did you fin
d a match last night?”

  The look in Mirabel’s eyes caught Lambsplitter by surprise. She’d expected disappointment, although she’d hoped for elation. What she saw was guarded joy. Joy? A frown displaced what little grip she’d had on her second smile of the day.

  Mirabel laboured her reply. “I ... I think I ... no, I know I did ... I know I found a match, but, well ... I’m not sure, mother. It’s strange, but I found it without recourse.”

  “Without? How could you possibly do that?”

  “I don’t know, but I did, without need of drawing out patterns, nor tasting spit or seed.”

  “Mirabel?”

  “Yes, Mother?”

  “I think you’d better tell me everything ... and I mean everything.”

  After her official welcome, and before the barges had entered, Mirabel had followed prescribed ordinance - as her childhood years had taught - and smelt out those nearest.

  She’d moved amongst the crowds, her nose drawing peaks and troughs of component oils from the odour of those about. Her mind had seen shape and weight, and colour and texture, had compared it all against those forms it held secure, the precious, kindred few she’d long been bequeathed.

  Not many had even come near, and those who had were found to be at fault somehow. Mirabel had begun to despair of even tasting spit when she again caught sight of the man at whom Cresmol and Nephril had been staring.

  There had clearly been something about him, something distracting, but she’d not been able to place it, and so had tried to put her thoughts aside. She’d found it impossible, though, not until his face once more became lost to the crowd.

  Lambsplitter and Mirabel were by now standing at the edge of the quay, stray clumps of wood and rope bobbing up and down on the dark harbour water, the wood corralled by seaweed and flecked with flies. The flotsam led Lady Lambsplitter’s gaze towards its source, towards the distant pavilion, but left her mind far, far away.

  She remembered her own time, how she’d also found sparsity, but for wholly different reasons. By Lambsplitter’s time, High Dicans had become decidedly thin on the ground, so thin in fact she’d failed to find a single match. She’d known then the need to look elsewhere, to sniff around where the power had leeched to - the new power.