The Gold Thief

by Justin Fisher

  “Yes, Bene?”

  “As you can no doubt see from the book in my hands, you are a very important spoke.”

  Bene drummed so furiously on Jonny Magik’s door that it was actually beginning to splinter by the time they were greeted by a weary-looking sin-eater.

  “Sorry, old friend, I was having me a bout of indigestion.”

  “Yes, yes, never mind all that. I need you to read this book, Jonny – can you work the symbols?”

  Sensing the Ringmaster’s mood, the sin-eater pored over the cover of the book carefully, as though it were some wild animal that needed to be tamed.

  “There’s great power in shapes made by hand, or in the colours one mixes and the notes one plays. They all have a different way of tapping into magic, into its power. There ain’t a shade of ink that won’t yield me its secrets. This tome feels mighty powerful, Bene, real mighty.” Ned saw a slight look of pain flicker across the man’s face as he handled the book’s leather. “The thing of it is whether I should?”

  When Benissimo answered, his voice was noticeably shaky. “Jonny, you’ve heard no doubt of the Darkening King?”

  “How the Veil was created? That old myth has never been proven, though there’s not a child on our side who hasn’t heard it, and I should think it’s been the culprit of many a wet bed!”

  “Proof is a funny thing. No one on the josser side believes in fairies or dragons and yet we know many of them as friend or foe. The Elder Librarian was quite clear, Jonny. The story is true, the very reason Aatol was built in the first place was to keep the information in your hands safe. The Book of Aatol contains the blueprints to bring the Darkening King back.”

  Jonny Magik snapped his hand open as though he’d been holding a hot coal. The Book of Aatol fell to the floor, face down but open. Across the rug of the sin-eater’s caravan ink began to ooze from its paper in small swirls of growing lines. The text from its pages was quite literally drawing itself on to the rug.

  “Well, if I needed any convincing,” breathed a now much-sobered sin-eater, “that ink is gettin’ me halfway there. I know that kind of magic better than most, Bene. Those letters are more than words: they’re memories, feelings good and bad. Ned, on my table, the handkerchief, if you would be so kind?”

  Ned passed it to him and watched as the sin-eater used it to pick up the book. He very carefully lifted it from the ground, taking special care to let the ink draw itself back on to its paper, before closing the cover and placing it down on his shelf.

  “I take on pain, Bene, that is my curse, and the book you want me to read is full of it. What you’re asking me to do, it will come at a price, and I’ll be the one paying.”

  Benissimo steeled himself, as he had countless times before. To the Ringmaster any price was clearly worth paying and every member of his troupe was expected to do so, where necessary, in full.

  “The price will be higher, for all of us, if Barba brings back the Darkening King.”

  “That’s his goal?” said Jonny, pale.

  “Yes. And our best chance is to read the book first, and find out how to stop him. Or work out how to hide it or destroy it, so he can’t get his hands on it.”

  Jonny looked at the crawling black ink. “I don’t know, Bene.”

  “The barrier that separates the Hidden from the jossers,” Bene said, “our entire way of life, was created as a reaction to this creature and the war he waged, or at least if the Librarian is to be believed. I saw what happened the last time the Hidden warred, Jonny, and it very nearly broke us. When we fought then, it was against the Darkening King’s servants. Imagine, if you will, how we would fare against their master?”

  “Surely that’s all the more reason to leave it unread?”

  “Madame Oublier said the Hidden are already talking about war. But they have no idea what lies ahead of them or what else Barbarossa is planning – and with my brother there is always something else. The Viceroy’s lancers fought hard in the last great war and are as legendary as his fleet. Brave beyond compare and willing to stake their lives on the outcome of any battle. I would hate to see his mighty owls dashed on the rocks of ignorance. That book is our best chance of staying ahead of Barba’s plans. Ned and Lucy overheard him talk about a location, where they were taking Ned’s father. Clearly the weapon is being built away from the Iron City. If we can find out where, then we can end this war before it starts.”

  The sin-eater let out a weary sigh.

  “Does your brother know about the book?”

  “It would appear so.”

  “He’s going to come looking for it, Bene.”

  “He’s come before. Find out what he’s up to, and we’ll at least have a chance to act before he strikes.” Benissimo paused and looked at Ned. “That’s not all: the book was meant for Ned and Lucy, who, it would appear, are both experiencing the same issues. If I’m to beat my brother, I’ll need them both in working order.”

  Jonny Magik cocked his head to one side and finally managed one of his broader smiles.

  “I can help Ned, Bene, but only if he’ll let me.”

  “He’ll let you all right,” said Bene. “I’ll make sure of it.”

  Sleep Tight

  ed had been “asked” to stay in his berth whilst their convoy travelled to the nearby mainland of Norway. Benissimo was obviously beyond worried and well he might be: they now had the blueprints to unspeakable power, blueprints an Engineer could use to reanimate an ancient Demon King, and Ned, their resident Engineer, was fast losing control over his gifts. Not only that but there was also the prophecy: he and Lucy had some additional role in this – though what it was, was still a mystery. How could he help anyone if he couldn’t control his ring?

  It wasn’t until they found a remote hamlet in the Norwegian countryside that Ned was allowed any company besides his shadow and mouse, and that company arrived in the vast form of George.

  “Ned, old bean, I thought you might like some grub.”

  “Not hungry, George, but thanks anyway.”

  The great ape put down the tray he’d prepared and sat at the foot of Ned’s bunk.

  “You sent the shivers up Benissimo, dear boy, that was quite the trick – and not for the first time.”

  “Yeah, yeah, it was, George. Only I didn’t do it on purpose, it was just like St Clotilde’s only this time I wasn’t even trying. The Amplification Engine just fired on its own.”

  George smiled knowingly and took a length of metal from his trunk.

  “You know, the first time I tried to bend a steel bar in front of an audience, I snapped it clear in half. Didn’t know my own strength, see? One offending piece tore the big top’s centre pole to shreds and the entire audience ran out screaming.”

  He worked the bar into a perfect knot and handed it to Ned.

  “Your ‘teething trouble’ is no worse than Lucy’s, Ned, and you didn’t actually hurt anyone. No one was screaming, at least not from fear, though the Elder did mention something about the whole of 1987 going up in flames.”

  Despite George’s well-meaning attempt at cheering Ned up, the ape was for once missing the point.

  “That’s just it. I was scared, George, and I still am now. Every time I cross the Veil it’s the same. In London, me, Mum and Dad, we tried to pretend, you know – to be normal, to not be this. But I’m not normal, am I?”

  “Whatever you think you are or aren’t doesn’t really matter. What matters is what you do. They’re all scared out there, Ned, of what’s coming, every last one of them. It’s when you fight it that you find your strength.”

  “Oh, George, it’s me that I’m scared of.”

  That night, Ned found himself being serenaded by Jonny Magik’s howling once more. Tonight it was louder and more strained than ever before. The poor man was reading the Book of Aatol and it was hurting him badly. It was with that awful thought that sleep took Ned, and the inevitable nightmare came knocking on his door. This time it was different. Ned was no longer
lost. The hot iron walls were riveted and familiar.

  He was aboard the Daedalus, Barbarossa’s iron ship, the same ship he’d always dreamt of, he realised now. The walls ripped open as before and in front of him lay the vastness of space. At the centre of a starless black was a ruined and crumbling Earth.

  “YeSss,” called the voice.

  But before Ned could answer, a hand, agitated and strong, clasped his shoulder and dragged him from his bed. Ned hit the floor of George’s trailer noisily and hard, opening his dazed eyes to see Jonny Magik towering over him, a look of focused malice cut clear across his face. Somewhere in the shadows, Gorrn rumbled frantically and Whiskers, now by Ned’s side, was squeaking noisily and baring his little teeth in a protective snarl.

  “Bounder! What are you doing to him?!” roared George, instantly awake.

  But before the ape could pounce, the sin-eater moved with singular purpose, answering with a tearing of paper and the unleashing of his magic. As the sheaf in his arms ripped, something on the ceiling above Ned’s bed howled with pain and fell into his mattress.

  The something was a Darkling, and a level 17, an entirely deadly Nightmonger. Ned’s nose filled with the stench of graveyard fungus and damp. The Darkling wore clothes but only so that it could pretend to be human when stalking its prey. Under the tattered rags that clung to its limbs was a hide as strong as knotweed and at its hands, instead of fingers, were two sets of elongated claws as sharp and long as kitchen knives. Its face was vaguely human, though its white rotting skin looked too tight for its bone-sharp features, or the needle-thin teeth that protruded from its lips.

  The creature was also shaking in great spasms of pain. Even in its agonised state it managed to murmur, over and over, “Libar-ex”.

  “A Nightmonger?” stammered Ned.

  “Yes, child. ‘Libar-ex’ is old tongue for book. The creature must have been waitin’ for us in Hjelmsøya, probably stowed away in our cargo hold, to get its hands on the Book of Aatol.”

  Ned looked at the creature’s claws and wondered what it might have done to him had it not been able to find the book.

  “Thank you, Jonny,” said Ned.

  “No problem. A paining spell is cruel but not deadly, it should more than hold him till we have him caged,” said Jonny. Which was when Ned noticed the expression on the sin-eater’s face. He looked drained, as if he were having one of his bouts of indigestion and a particularly nasty one at that.

  A stunned George put on his spectacles and turned on his bedside light to get a closer look at their unwelcome visitor.

  “I say, Jonny, I-I thought you were trying to harm Ned. Thank goodness you were here.” And then the great ape’s brow turned to a lumpy furrow as he tried to figure out why. “Exactly what were you doing here, and in the middle of the night?”

  Just then there was a knock on the door of the trailer. Ned opened it to see Lucy standing there.

  “Bene found a Darkling in one of the cargo holds,” she said. “There’s quite the commotion. The whole troupe are searching for stowaways.”

  Ned nodded, and gestured to the frozen Nightmonger on the bed.

  “Oh,” said Lucy.

  Jonny looked to Lucy and smiled. Then he turned back to George, his eyes bright.

  “You asked why I came to this trailer,” he said. “The answer is that I need to talk to Ned. And Lucy too, in fact. Your timing is perfect, Lucy.”

  “Very well,” said George. “Can I offer you tea, anything …?”

  “I need to talk to them in private,” said Jonny.

  George sighed. “I see. Well, I suppose I’d better get this blighter to a cage.”

  No sooner had George left with the Nightmonger than the sin-eater’s mask of calm promptly dropped. The man looked positively unwell, as though fighting a terrible sickness right down to the core of his very being. When the sin-eater started talking, any semblance of control finally left him – it was like listening to the ramblings of a madman, or a man who’d been possessed.

  “I started reading the book as we crossed the sea. I’ve seen the darkness!”

  “Jonny, what are you talking about? You’re scaring us,” said Lucy.

  “The book, the book’s pages are riddled with his power.”

  “Whose power?” asked Ned.

  “The Darkening King. I heard it speak through the letters of the book.”

  “What … what did it say?” said Lucy.

  Jonny Magik let out a long breath. “It said Ned and it said Lucy.”

  “And what did it sound like?”

  Jonny kept his eyes on hers. “It sounded like rocks, grinding together. Like faraway thunder.” Then he turned to Ned. “Tell me, Ned. Have you heard a voice like that? In your dreams, perhaps?”

  Ned couldn’t look away. “Yes,” he breathed.

  “As has Lucy,” said Jonny.

  “So you’re saying …” began Lucy.

  But even as she asked, Ned knew, knew just as surely as he had in Aatol but had been too afraid to admit.

  “Yes,” said Jonny. “The voice that has been plaguing you both. I believe it belongs to the Darkening King.”

  Little Devils

  ssassins enjoy subterfuge of every kind. The world behind the Veil is one of shadows and half-truths, and of all its players, there is none more able than Carrion Slight. Most people would be afraid of a being made of metal. There is a lifelessness to their eyes that conceals their true intent. But the Central Intelligence intrigued him. It was unique. A sentient being with an artificial mind, completely devoid of guilt or remorse. In many ways not so different from Carrion himself.

  He leant in closely over the desk. On its surface were a dozen minuscule tickers. A large magnifying glass was held in place on a metal arm, fixed so that he could see their every detail. Magnified as they were, they looked menacing and cruel. Like winged scorpions. Every part of their sensors, arms, casing and needle-thin blades was designed flawlessly for the acts of surveillance and harm.

  “Fascinating,” he said. “And you’re sure it will work?”

  Behind him, seemingly all around him, the room came alive with the sinewy clattering of the Central Intelligence.

  “Sure? Bzzt. Of course. There is no maybe, or perhaps. Tsk. The Central Intelligence knows only ‘1’ and ‘0’, yes or – dzzzt – no.”

  As it spun its cogs indignantly, the tickers on the table sprang to life, launching themselves at the magnifying glass in front of Carrion’s face.

  T’ching! T’ching! T’ching!

  Over and over they struck at the lens in a whirlwind of metal venom. Each and every one broke itself against it, their parts falling to the table’s surface like scattered leaves till finally –

  Crack!

  The glass shattered and the remaining three tickers stopped – centimetres from the assassin’s face, hovering in place and poised to strike.

  “My swarm – tsk – is ready.”

  At-lan

  he circus kept moving.

  Benissimo urged his troupe onwards relentlessly. They travelled beyond Norway into eastern Europe, crossing borders by air and always in the dead of night. The Twelve had long suspected the Shar of Shalazaar’s involvement in Barbarossa’s plans, and with Gearnish’s doors firmly closed there was no way of knowing how many allies the butcher had in his pocket, so it was impossible to know where was safe – the Circus of Marvels moved now as if fugitives, unsure of who they could and couldn’t trust.

  The only thing was to keep going.

  Ned woke the next morning, in a field somewhere in Russia, with a feeling of cold dread gripping his bones. If Jonny Magik was actually frightened, a man who had seen so much of the world’s anger and fear, where did that leave Ned and Lucy? Ned’s powers were slipping from his control and his mum and dad were held prisoner, that much he knew. But last night’s revelation had been terrifying. Evil was actually speaking to him and Lucy, and it was real.

  For now, though, the sin-eater ha
d promised not to tell Benissimo. The Ringmaster was already deeply distressed at the thought of the Darkening King’s possible return, but to think that the creature was actually in communication with two of his troupe would take him beyond distress.

  Benissimo, Lucy, George and the Tinker were waiting with Jonny Magik, to hear about his reading of the Book of Aatol. Last night’s intruders had caused quite a stir and even the Tinker’s mind was for once on something other than his beloved city. But there was something else. George was smiling at Jonny Magik. Not only smiling but sharing a bunch of treasured bananas with the sin-eater! There is very little one can do to gain the trust of a suspicious ape when it comes to his wards. In fact there is only one thing one can do: and that is to save them.

  “Well, I can finally see why you gave him the job, Bene, you should have seen him!” said George. “I have to admit, ink-spells are handier in a pinch than I had at first thought.”

  “Which, my hairy friend, is what I have been trying to tell you.”

  What surprised Ned more than the shift in his roommate’s behaviour towards Jonny Magik, was the magician’s easy manner. Somehow, between last night and the morning, Jonny had re-composed himself. But how? Ned sat beside Lucy. Whatever he was frightened of was plaguing her too, and they shared a sympathetic glance.

  “Your book has led me on quite a dance, Ned,” began Jonny. “The magic in its symbols is mighty powerful and there’s been some rough going.” The sin-eater paused as some memory of what he’d experienced ran through him. “I read things that weren’t meant for my eyes, felt things that I’d sooner forget.”

  “I’m so sorry,” offered Lucy.

  “Quite all right, child. See, when I take on something I don’t like, something bad, I write it down. It’s powerful stuff when I use it right and I use it for just about everything.”

  The mystery that was Jonny Magik rolled up his sleeve to demonstrate.