by Tom Fletcher
‘I used to live in it, Nora. There’re no secrets in there, just people performing the same actions, day in, day out. They’re not manufacturing anything, just following patterns.’
‘Not secrets, then. But perhaps records. Information.’
Alan shrugged. ‘Perhaps.’ He nodded at her bloody hands. ‘But what about our friend down there? What did he tell you?’
‘He has been overseeing this entire operation – your retrieval and your son’s silencing – so he knew a lot.’
Knew. Alan didn’t say anything.
‘We can save your son. But the initial plan must remain the same: acquire the contraband, then you go to meet your contact amongst the Arbitrators. They will agree, whether they are more interested in the mushrooms or your head. Success is more likely if you have something to trade. Something of value, besides yourself.’
‘One thing I don’t understand,’ Alan said. ‘You’re a Mapmaker – if you want to get into the Pyramid, why don’t you just ask other Mapmakers? Don’t you all have a common cause?’
Nora hesitated. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘we do.’
‘Why don’t you storm it?’
‘The Mapmakers have excommunicated me,’ Nora said. She smiled again, briefly, and then looked down towards the distant floor.
Alan shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. He refused to believe what he was hearing. Not the Mapmakers too?
‘I’ll show them,’ Nora said suddenly, looking back up. Her face was set in a snarl. ‘I’ll show them how to do it.’
‘The maps,’ Alan said. ‘It’s just a rumour, isn’t it? You just want to prove yourself. You don’t know any more than any other Mapmaker.’
‘I need to prove myself,’ Nora said.
‘What the fuck did you do?’
Nora rolled her eyes. ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Desecration. It was nothing.’
‘Is that … bad? Desecration? It sounds like it could be serious.’
‘It was nothing. I just said that.’
‘Nothing for us to fret about, then.’
‘Well …’ Nora pursed her lips. ‘Punishable by death,’ she said.
Alan stared at her.
‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘They have to catch me first.’
PART TWO
14
The Cup and Skull
‘So we’ve got Daunt and her crew, the Pyramid, half of the House of a Thousand Hollows, maybe including Birdface. Bandits and general arseholes and now Mapmakers, too. Bleeding Mapmakers.’ Eyes was counting them up on his fingers. ‘Anybody else we gone and pissed off? Anyone else we want to, while we’re at it? Why don’t we just go and each lay a big fat turd in Old Green’s mouth, eh? Just to make sure we’re well and truly fucked.’
‘Well, we’re going to Dok,’ murmured Spider. ‘We could.’
‘Don’t be angry, Eyes,’ Nora said. She sat cross-legged on top of the pipe next to Raspy’s dead body, which was dripping blood into the red pool beneath, and cleaned her tools with a damp piece of cloth. She’d gone outside to wash herself in a half-barrel water butt she knew of while Alan filled the others in. Water sources were one of the many features Mapmakers were required to document.
‘Don’t be angry? Don’t be bleedin’ angry? Easy for you to say, missy!’ Eyes, beet-faced, pointed at Raspy’s corpse. ‘You clearly don’t feel a damn thing.’
Alan watched Nora continue cleaning her kit. They needed her, he knew they did – more than that: they were utterly dependent on her. She knew the way and she could fight better than the rest of them put together. But she made him feel cold in his stomach. He couldn’t deny that she was monstrous. Was she some kind of devil?
‘My advice,’ Nora said to Eyes, ‘is to meditate every morning and every night. I can teach you. I have crystals and incense here in my pack. I know several highly effective mantras, and a sheaf of mandala designs that you could borrow if you so wish.’
‘Meditate, she says!’ Eyes shouted. He jabbed his finger at the corpse once again, looking as if he were about to explode, then turned sharply on his heels and marched away.
‘You in particular would find it beneficial,’ Nora called after him.
‘What did you do?’ Spider asked. ‘What was your desecration?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘But what is desecration, to a Mapmaker?’
‘The Mapmaker tribes are intensely ritualistic,’ Nora said. ‘My father always said that Mapmaking is not a religion, but it is. That’s exactly what it is. We don’t use the word “holy”, but we have holy places, holy objects, and the force that gives our lives meaning is … faith. Understand, nobody is waiting for us to finish our maps. We will never finish. Our rituals revolve around the undertaking of some inherited, ancient, impossible task and not some intangible deity, but still …’ She paused. ‘Many actions are desecratory or blasphemous. Questioning the purpose of our work – that is blasphemous. Damaging or disrespecting a completed volume of maps, for example – that is desecration.’
‘Do you consider such behaviour wrong?’
‘No.’
‘But you continue the Mapmakers’ work.’
Nora leaned forward. ‘I have my own reasons,’ she said. ‘Firstly, if I can find this cache, this trove, then they will let me back. My sins, such as they are, would be absolved. I don’t need forgiveness or absolution, but I do not want to have to hide from my people for ever. I want them to see me.’ She thought for a moment. ‘I want them to thank me. I want them to be beholden. I want them to know that they were wrong.’ Her voice hardened. ‘I don’t want them to forgive me. I want them to ask me my forgiveness. I want them to plead for it.’
Churr cleared her throat. ‘We should think about our next move.’ She looked at Alan. ‘If they wanted you, they will still want you. They will know soon that their raid failed. They will come again. We should get moving.’
‘Your instruments and provisions are over there.’ Nora pointed towards the pile of material she’d gathered from the Cavern Tavern.
‘Not my bloody drums,’ Eyes growled.
‘No, not your drums,’ Nora said. ‘Of course not.’
Alan was picking through the pile. ‘I didn’t actually have any money on me last night,’ he said. ‘Not after I bought the drinks. Anybody else?’
‘A little,’ replied Spider.
‘Aye,’ Eyes said, ‘but only a little here, too.’
‘And there’s no food here,’ Alan said. ‘Only whisky. And cigarettes.’
‘That’s all you had,’ Nora said.
‘Well, what are we going to do?’ Eyes asked.
‘There’s a lot to eat out here if you know how to hunt and forage,’ Nora said, ‘but you have your instruments – your livelihoods, unless I am mistaken? I propose you play for shelter and sustenance. Our passage will be easier and safer that way. And I do not want to have to try to keep you all alive on snails, moss and snake-meat.’
‘I don’t much want that either,’ Alan said.
‘There are communities, transient hubs, strongholds,’ Nora said. ‘If we can move from here and lie low for a few hours, then I can plan our route.’
‘The Cup and Skull?’ Churr asked.
‘Yes,’ Nora replied.
‘Wait,’ Eyes said, ‘wait. Is that it? All decided, just like that?’
Nora slid from the top of the pipe and landed lightly, crouching. She stood up. ‘That’s where my materials are,’ she said.
‘So what? You’re the boss now?’ Eyes appealed to Alan: ‘I thought this was your game. Who do we follow? We following her, or following you?’
‘We’re in the Discard proper now,’ Alan said. ‘This is Nora’s country.’
‘She’s a sadist. She’s a gorehound.’
‘I’m right here.’
Alan closed his eyes. His shirt smelled bad and felt stiff against his skin. He found a crumpled cigarette in his shirt pocket, put it in his mouth, lit it, inhaled. He thought about Billy i
n a pale marble cell. ‘Nora is our best hope,’ he said. ‘Nora knows the way.’ Thick white smoke came out with his words. ‘Nora is exactly what we need.’
She smiled at him. He could see that there was still dried blood beneath her green fingernails. He couldn’t smile back.
The others set to gathering their belongings. Alan watched, the cigarette hanging limply from between his lips. He watched Spider shoulder his violin case, Eyes rifle through his sackcloth backpack, Churr don a thin leather jacket. He noticed a disturbance in the red pool and watched as a large flat toad hauled itself out of the sludge and onto the side. Its body was like a warty bag of sand. Oily red liquid ran between the pimply bumps of its skin. It blinked and puffed up its throat, croaked, and then lurched off across the expanse of floor, leaving a greasy crimson trail.
‘That was a rustbelly flat,’ Spider said. ‘I think it’s a wayspro rustbelly, to be specific. Very potent. I’ve heard them called Omentoads.’
‘Good or bad?’ Alan asked.
‘Pretty much like anything else: depends on how much you take, and how you take it.’ He licked his lips. ‘I’m going to go and get it.’
‘I meant, is it a good or bad omen?’
‘Oh. Well, the details are in the visions they grant.’
‘Spider, it just came out of that toxic crap. Don’t tell me you’re going to squeeze it.’
Spider looked at Alan. His beard made him difficult to read. ‘Kill it, clean it, squeeze it,’ he said. He drew a small knife from his belt, spun it, caught it by the handle. ‘We’ll be looking round Time’s corners tonight, son.’
‘Are we going to see anything good?’
Spider smiled. His eyes glimmered, deep, dark wells.
*
The Cup and Skull was low-down inside a labyrinthine concrete nightmare. From an open door green light spilled into a wide, dingy corridor that felt like the bottom of a ravine. They could hear the throaty chug of motorcycle engines as they approached the green light, and sure enough, when they got there, bikers were swarming around the place like bees around sunbladders. Concrete walls rose to darkness above. Nora told them the corridor was part of what the Mapmakers called the First Structure.
‘We think that when the Builders created Gleam, they started with one vast building: one huge concrete shape, designed to house all of the different functions of the place. It didn’t work, of course, so additions were thrown up all the time, but beneath it and through it all there seems to be this one primary structure. A Gleam-wide castle, almost, as if it were just turned upside down out of a mould. Then the various systems were put in: the pipes, the rivers, the machines. But you can traverse Gleam without leaving this one concrete … thing, if you want. A lot of it is too close to the swamp for most travellers, and much of it is dangerously enclosed – good for bandit ambushes. The bikers love it, though. The corridors are so flat and so wide.’
‘I knew about the biker paths,’ Spider said, ‘but not the First Structure.’ He raised his small, square glass. ‘To Bloody Nora,’ he said. ‘To our education.’
Alan joined him, as did Churr. Eyes too, after a moment, but half-heartedly.
The Cup was serving great hunks of snail, grilled with lemon from the Archway Gardens. It was full of bikers and transients, all looking to get in on the feast. The small tavern was packed full of black leather and tattooed skin and the air smelled of oil.
‘We should eat as much as we can,’ Nora said, ‘while we have the opportunity.’
‘I’m not eating that snail,’ Churr said. ‘A snail that big will have been full of worms.’
‘It’s cooked, though,’ Nora said. ‘If we get it well-done, any parasites will be killed. Then they’re as nutritious as the snail itself.’
‘We haven’t got no bugs,’ Eyes said.
‘Then play your music,’ Nora said. ‘For Green’s sake, we’ve been through this.’
‘Will they like us, do you reckon?’
‘I don’t know. Find out. I’m going up to my room to plan our route. Bring me some snail.’ Nora stood up and pushed her way through the mass.
‘Oh, I like that,’ Eyes said. ‘Just leaving us to it. And how’s she paying for her room, anyway?’
‘How do you think?’ Churr asked. ‘The normal way. Bugs.’
‘Eyes,’ Alan said, ‘leave off Nora. I can’t be doing with this constant sniping. Leave off Nora, or leave us.’ He held his hands up, palms out. ‘And don’t start. I’m not going to fight with you again. Just … let her be. For the sake of this whole endeavour, let her speak without jumping down her throat. We’ve got enough to deal with without turning on each other.’
Eyes knocked his whisky back and frowned. ‘Aye,’ he said.
*
Pighead introduced them all to a couple of wiry, hard-eyed men. ‘These’re my Bastards,’ he said. ‘They’ll clear some space for you.’ The Bastards each had the sign of The Cup and Skull tattooed onto their cheeks. They didn’t say anything to the band, just slid into the crowd and started shoving people aside. Pighead raised an eyebrow at Alan. ‘You’ll be good, right? Put on a good show?’
‘Well, yeah,’ Alan said.
‘Our patrons are used to drinking uninterrupted. Better be worth their attention or they won’t thank you.’
‘We’ll be good, all right?’
‘You keep them in here boozing, even after we’re all out of snail, and you get rooms. That’s the deal.’
‘Plate some up for us, eh?’
‘You and me, laddie,’ Pighead said, getting up close to Alan, ‘we’re not familiar enough for that kind of talk, okay?’
‘Excuse me,’ Alan said, ‘your beard’s tickling my nose. You’re making me want to sneeze. Yes, that’s – that’s better. Thank you.’ Alan pinched his nose for a moment, then said, ‘Pighead. Pighead? Pighead, please plate us up some of that awful snail-meat. Is that better?’
‘Ignore him, Pighead,’ Churr said. ‘He’s a dick.’
‘Too right,’ Pighead said, and he moved on.
‘Why do you do this, Alan?’ Churr said. ‘I’ve known you, like, three days and already I think you’re a dick.’
‘Three days? Is that all?’
‘It’s like you actively try to be a smartarse, actively try to piss everybody off. I think things would be easier for you if you tried not to be a smartarse.’
‘I’ve got a reputation to maintain.’
‘Not the reputation you think, maybe.’
Alan laughed. ‘Maybe.’
‘You’re not in the House any more, Alan. You’re not Wild Alan, the entertainer. You haven’t got Maggie at your back. Things are different out here. We’ve got to be careful.’
‘Yeah,’ Alan said, ‘sorry, Churr. I’m just … I don’t know how to be.’
‘I can see that. Hey …’ She grabbed his shoulder. ‘Looks like they’re ready for you all to get set up.’
‘Can you sing?’
‘Not at all.’
‘I’ll see you afterwards, then.’
‘I’ll be watching.’
Eyes was wrestling the tarp from a drum-kit made of barrels and crocodile skin. ‘Gonna sound like shite,’ he said.
‘It’ll be fine,’ Alan said. ‘But you need to think of something to use in places where they don’t have drums.’
‘Bongos?’ Eyes said.
‘I don’t know. I was thinking more of a set-up that means you can just use something that’s already there. Like, if they have a generator, then you could just bang on any old crap and run it through a mic. And if they don’t have a generator, then just hit harder.’
‘Hit what, though?’
‘I don’t know. Rocks, logs … pots and pans.’
‘Like a kid.’
‘Yeah, like a kid. Like the big kid that you deep down are. The big, deep, angry kid, that’s you. Big angry kid with the shakes and hysterical episodes.’
‘Yeah, yeah. I got a lot of respect for you too.’
&nb
sp; ‘I know you do. Who doesn’t?’
‘Give me a hand, you. What are you? You’re a turd with a hard-on, that’s what you are.’
The Cup and Skull was small compared to the Cavern Tavern, so in theory they didn’t need amplification. They did need everyone to stop shouting, though. Alan stood and looked into the press of bikers and transients and felt briefly that he and the band should not have been there: these people hadn’t come to hear music, they’d come to eat and drink and they weren’t interested, not in the slightest. But then Spider shut them up with a wildly dissonant shriek from his violin, and before anybody had time to protest he launched into a furiously fast melody that left Eyes and Alan struggling to catch up.
Within twenty minutes, Alan was standing on the audience’s hands, howling lyrics down at upturned faces as he was passed from one to the next. The air was hot. The drums were loud and Eyes was doing something fast, syncopated; the rhythm had a juddery quality, as if it was on the verge of breaking down, but it never quite did. Alan looked down at bald heads, braided beards, hair dyed all colours and plaited into tight rows like seams across scalps. Somebody passed him a drink, which he necked, thinking it was water, but it wasn’t. Somebody else passed him another one.
When he performed, Alan’s mind split into two: the larger, unthinking part through which the music and the lyrics channelled themselves, and a small, quiet voice at the back of his head that watched and observed. And the small quiet voice was approving. Most of these people had never heard Alan or the others before. They were making new fans, new allies for what was coming.
At least when he was performing he felt like he was good at something.
*
‘It tastes like mud,’ Spider said, chewing thoughtfully, ‘but perhaps it’s a bit more bitter.’
‘Needs a lot of chewing,’ Eyes said, poking at the meat on his plate with a crooked-tined fork. ‘It’s like trying to chew noses.’
Alan gazed miserably down at his own meal. The aroma of lemon – and what else? Wild garlic, probably – was delicious, but the smell in no way made up for the off-putting appearance of the grey-brown lump of noduled flesh in front of him. They’d all asked for their snail to be grilled crispy, and it had been, but they might as well have asked for a jug of piss to be served ice-cold and expected it to be easy to drink. ‘Come on,’ Alan said. ‘We’ve all eaten snail before. Raw, sometimes.’ Though even to himself he could not deny that the hunk of giant snail was actually less appealing than a pile of small ones.