A Tangle of Gold

by Jaclyn Moriarty

  ‘I am somewhat at sea here,’ Samuel said, ‘but I perceive that you read much when in the World. As to a wicker chair in artichoke.’ He clambered to his feet. ‘I am ready to carry forth. Others have already reached the edges of the Pale Grey.’

  Madeleine peered into the distance. Tiny pieces of the Grey were stirring in the fan-created breeze.

  ‘But tell me, Madeleine,’ Samuel said as they set off, ‘those episodes you experienced. Would you say that they were dreams or visions?’

  Madeleine laughed. ‘That’s the question.’

  ‘Quite.’ Samuel frowned. ‘That was my question.’

  6

  On the evening before the scheduled meeting with Elliot, they arrived at the riverside village of Shy-Marlow.

  They had travelled in the back of a hay wagon that day, and now they stood in the village square, brushing hay from each other’s hair. Samuel pointed to a map that was painted on the cobblestones.

  ‘Your meeting with Elliot is at twelve-thirty tomorrow?’ he said. ‘On the southern edge of Lake Swithburne, Magical North?’

  Madeleine agreed.

  ‘It seems to me that it is no more than a four-hour hike from here to that lake.’ Samuel pointed. ‘As to a hockey stick in scented caterpillar.’

  ‘We should start walking now then,’ Madeleine said. ‘It’s only five o’clock, and it’s summer so it’ll stay light. We can camp at the lake tonight.’

  Samuel knelt by the map and ran his fingers across it. ‘It seems a tiny lake,’ he murmured. ‘Far smaller than the Lake of Spells which is another several hours journey to the north.’ He glanced back up at her. ‘Indeed, and I suggest we set off on the morrow. Our journey is almost complete. Let us celebrate by staying in an inn tonight. We shall arise early and depart well-fed and rested.’

  ‘But what if we get lost on the way?’ Madeleine argued. ‘I think—’ and then, as Samuel held her gaze, she faltered. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘Call yourself my apologies,’ Samuel said with great formality. ‘I am not well.’

  Then he curled himself onto the ground and closed his eyes.

  *

  Half an hour later, Madeleine had helped Samuel to the Woodsman’s Tavern on Shy-Marlow’s High Street.

  Their room was small, almost filled by the two large beds, each draped with a featherdown quilt. Samuel lay on one of these, breathing with a slow, scraping sound. His face seemed a spider’s web of raised, crimson veins.

  ‘I suppose the medication is fading,’ Samuel whispered. ‘It has not lasted quite as I assumed. As to a . . .’

  ‘I’ll go and find a doctor.’ Madeleine stepped towards the door.

  ‘No. No. There is nought a doctor can do. I needs must rest, that is all. Please, stay with me and we shall converse.’

  There was a jug of lemon water and a bowl of wildberries on the sideboard. ‘You can see the river from here,’ Madeleine said at the window, and then warning bells clanged importantly and the inn’s shutters rushed the room to darkness.

  ‘These Colours are getting to be too much.’ Madeleine lit the lanterns.

  From the dim light of the bed, Samuel took another rasping breath. ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘It is tiresome.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be so bad,’ she said, ‘if it wasn’t for the Knotted Charcoals everywhere.’

  ‘Knotted what?’

  ‘Charcoals. The Knotted Charcoals.’

  Samuel handed back the glass and leaned against the pillow, breathing more quietly. ‘I have heard tell of Charcoal Blacks,’ he said, ‘but never a Knotted Charcoal.’

  ‘Well, me neither,’ Madeleine admitted. ‘And actually that’s just the name I’ve given them. I mean those little patches of Charcoal that are flying around everywhere? They’re all knotted up.’

  Samuel studied her. He scratched his ear. ‘You are suggesting,’ he said, ‘that you see patches of tangled darkness in the air?’

  ‘Not suggesting,’ Madeleine said. ‘I do. Look. There are some. They’re all over Cello. Ever since I got back from the World, they’ve been driving me crazy. That farmhouse of Gabe’s was full of them, especially when people were around. That’s why I spent so much time alone in the living room. I mean, they don’t hurt you or anything, they’re just there.’

  ‘Can you see them now?’

  ‘I can’t believe you’re asking me that. There are about five of them circling you.’

  Madeleine sat on the edge of his bed and held out the bowl of wildberries. Samuel waved these away.

  ‘Madeleine,’ he said. ‘You are a magic-weaver.’

  ‘Oh, cut it out with the magic-weaver stuff.’ She felt irritable. Samuel looked terrible, and she didn’t know how to help.

  ‘Those patches of black you see are moments of pain, anger, illness, wrongdoing, sadness and fear,’ Samuel said. ‘Magic-weavers can see these, although most need to focus to do so. Hence, they ask people to describe their pain—its appearance, colour, sound, ranking and so forth—anything to make it vivid. It then comes into focus and the magic-weaver can see the knots and untangle them. You must be quite a magic-weaver, for it seems you can see the darkness without even concentrating.’

  ‘I’m not a magic-weaver,’ Madeleine said. ‘You’re sick and it’s making you delusional. I told you before, I lived in Cello all my life—except for that time in the World—and I never saw magic once. These are just Charcoals.’

  Samuel smiled kindly. ‘I read much about magic,’ he said, ‘when I was on the R.Y.A. Magic-weavers must be active of body and fierce of mind. Perhaps you used your time in the World to develop your powers of mind? Of concentration and introspection? Call yourself my apologies, Madeleine, but your reputation as a Princess was not particularly academic. Yet, it appears you read often in the World?’

  ‘I did,’ she said. ‘But you’re talking bollocks.’

  ‘As to a teaspoon,’ Samuel muttered. ‘This bollocks? Another thing I read was that magic-weavers need to know themselves. One cannot focus upon the outer unless one has confronted oneself. Now, by going to the World—perhaps even by going to the space between—perchance you have done this? Have you ever disappeared deep inside yourself?’

  Outside, the warning bells signalled the all-clear. The shutters flew up and Madeleine blinked against the sunlight.

  ‘You’re talking rubbish,’ she said.

  Samuel was still smiling to himself. He sat up and crossed his legs. ‘How did you and your mother get back from the World?’ he asked. ‘I believe I heard that you stumbled?’

  ‘I made us stumble,’ Madeleine said.

  ‘Nobody can make themselves stumble.’

  ‘Well, I did.’

  Samuel shook his head. ‘It has never happened.’

  She considered tipping the jug of water over his head. ‘I knew you needed absence and emotion to stumble,’ she explained patiently. ‘I saw them in the air and I sort of grabbed hold of them and held my mother’s hand and we stumbled.’

  Now Samuel scrambled onto his knees. ‘Ho ho! You saw absence and emotion! Madeleine, it is definite! Nought but a magic-weaver could see such!’

  ‘Belle saw them. She’s the one who pointed them out to me.’

  ‘Belle. Who is this Belle?’

  ‘I told you about Jack and Belle. They were my best friends in the World. Jack can read the stars, and Belle can read auras. I think that’s why she could see them.’

  Samuel paused. ‘Interesting. At any rate, Madeleine, I assure you that none has ever stumbled by choice before. It happens when emotion and absence are so powerful they crack open reality. Whereas you took hold of their concentrated forms! It must have been agony! With the tangled darkness you can see here, it is not a matter of taking hold: these must needs be untangled.’

  ‘These are Knotted Charcoals,’ Madeleine persisted.

  ‘There is no such thing.’ Samuel lay back down again. ‘I will rest a day or two while you go to meet Elliot. I would only hold you up. Is that to you
r liking?’

  ‘I’m not leaving you here.’

  ‘You needs must,’ Samuel said. ‘Elliot will be waiting. Eventually, I’ll make my way to the Lake of Spells. Meantime, once you arrive in the Magical North, you will see pure magic everywhere. This, one day you will learn to weave into spells.’

  Madeleine frowned. ‘Hang on,’ she said. ‘Do you seriously believe I could do magic-weaving? I mean, you think I could make a spell that could heal you?’

  ‘Theoretically, yes. More simply, however, the patches you see around me are the black magic I suffer. You could untangle them. That would ease my pain.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘You persist in doubting me. Madeleine, if I have been one thing, it is earnest. Anxious, too, in the past. This poisoning, at least, has made me see that anxiety is as to a buttercup in sand dunes.’

  Madeleine moved closer, studying the knots that hovered by Samuel’s shoulders and chest.

  ‘You think I can just unknot these?’

  Samuel sighed and closed his eyes. ‘Call yourself my foolishness. I have not been clear. Theoretically, you could. But even the greatest magic-weavers practise for years. You must learn to loosen threads precisely or you yourself will suffer. Nor yet can any living magic-weaver conjure a spell to cure Olde Quainte magic. Your sister summoned the greatest to my hospital bed. She beckoned, too, the noblest physicians and apothecaries. This was all before we were placed under house arrest, of course. I needs must tell you of the ointments, salves, poultices,

  bone marrow transplants, veritable battery of magic and non-magic that your sister insisted they try. None worked. All that was left was the medicine that helped to ease the pain and prolong life. That, now, as you know is gone.’ He turned his head to the side, tucking his arm under the pillow.

  Madeleine reached towards the closest knot. It appeared to be soft and filmy. She touched it and sprang away. ‘It stung me!’

  Samuel opened his eyes.

  ‘Do not try. It will only harm you. The truly marvellous thing is that you can see—most magic-weavers need tools to focus, as I said. Perhaps your World friends helped you find your focus? Jack taught you to see the distant magic—the stars—and Belle to see the magic close to you? Or perhaps it is your own imagination.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Madeleine watched the knots through narrowed eyes. ‘I’d like all the credit for myself. But I miss Belle and Jack. A lot. They were awesome. I never got to say goodbye to them,’ she added.

  ‘They are part of you now and always will be.’ Samuel’s voice had slipped into a murmur. He was falling asleep. ‘How grand that they filled you with awe. Goodnight, Madeleine, I will see you on the morrow. We will breakfast and then I will fare you well.’

  Madeleine looked down at him. His breathing was like boots on gravel.

  She reached out slowly for the knot once more, then swore and sucked on her stinging hand.

  She waited, glared, and reached for it again.

  Two hours later, Madeleine had finished unknotting the smallest of the darknesses. Her fingers and palms were studded with blisters. She was drenched in sweat. Samuel’s breathing was softer. His face looked calmer. The swelling around his eyes had gone down.

  ‘I’ll untangle the rest through the night,’ she told him. ‘And when I get to the Magical North, I’ll weave a spell that cures you.’

  Samuel slept on.

  ‘Well, anyway, I’ll try,’ she conceded. ‘Who knows how you weave a spell. And I can’t believe how much this unknotting hurts.’

  She glanced at the window. Outside the light was turning mild and blue with dusk.

  Tomorrow she was going to see Elliot. She and Elliot would lead the Loyalist army. They would save the Kingdom; they would cure it of Colours.

  She imagined Elliot’s face. She imagined how their smiles would grow as they approached each other. She imagined saying, Hey, Elliot. Telling Elliot, Turns out, I’m a magic-weaver. She imagined his eyebrows lifting at that. She imagined reaching out to touch his face around his smile.

  1

  The car turned into an empty parking lot. Gravel was bright with sunlight. The tyres made a friendly crunchy noise. A bicycle wheel was hooked onto a tree, and it spun in the breeze. SWITHBURNE LAKE, said a wooden sign, but they couldn’t see the lake from here: it was blocked by a stand of snow-draped pines.

  Elliot looked around the car. There was the box of tissues on the dashboard. The plastic bag full of trash, its handles wound around the gear stick. The stack of music files.

  Beside him, the driver pulled on the handbrake and switched off the ignition. The engine blinked into silence.

  ‘It’s noon,’ said the driver. ‘We’re half an hour early.’

  The driver was Mischka Tegan.

  2

  Mischka had arrived in the Hostile compound two days after the Assistant accepted Elliot as a Hostile.

  Her arrival altered the tone of the place. Voices and footsteps seemed both calm and brisk now. Five of the permanent residents, including Chime, were sent to other compounds. A new chef arrived, re-organised and cleaned the kitchen. Food standards rose dramatically.

  Elliot was told to do nothing but rest and exercise. His bandages were removed.

  He didn’t meet Mischka until five days after her arrival. Early one morning, while he was still asleep, she came into his room. She asked Ming-Sun to leave them. Then she sat on Ming-Sun’s chair and studied Elliot’s face as he awoke.

  Elliot sat up.

  For the next ten minutes, neither of them said a word.

  At first, Elliot was trying to figure out how to stop himself getting up and hurling this woman from the room. But she just sat there staring. He started noticing things about her. Her elegant posture. Her chewed nails. Her thin sweater, sleeves pushed up to her elbows. The uneven dusting of makeup. Her cheekbones, sharp like her daughter’s. He looked at the line of her nose, and at her eyebrows. She seemed to break into separate parts. His anger also fragmented. The noise of it quietened.

  *

  Right at that point, Mischka pushed her hair behind her ears.

  ‘You recognise me,’ she said. ‘I taught at your school. I hung out with your dad. You knew me as Mischka Tegan.’

  Elliot blinked.

  ‘I believe you also know that I am Keira Platter’s mother.’

  He didn’t nod, but stared.

  ‘I’ve been a Hostile for years,’ she continued. ‘I went to Bonfire to work with your father and uncle. We knew they were Loyalists, and very bright inventors. A Hostile alliance had been formed, and we had in mind a scheme: figure out how to cut through to the World, and send the Royal Family across.’

  Her voice was clear, low and authoritative. Like a teacher setting out the background to an experiment.

  ‘But your dad and uncle found out who I was. I called in help. It was a bad night. Your uncle ended up dead. Your dad ended up over the ravine.’

  She stopped speaking. Again, they stared at one another. Her face coloured. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said. She pushed her chair back and walked out of the room.

  A few days later, Elliot woke again to see Mischka seated by the bed. He had to disentangle himself from his dream.

  ‘It’s time to make the call,’ she said.

  ‘What call?’

  ‘The Assistant tells me you’ll help us by using your contacts in Bonfire.’

  He was still trying to break out of his sleep.

  ‘Most of the Royal Family are staying at the farmhouse of a friend of yours named Gabe,’ Mischka continued. ‘The King is with your parents.’

  ‘How do you know all this?’ Elliot asked.

  She shrugged. ‘We know. You should call Gabe rather than your parents. They’d be more likely to pick up on any hesitation in your voice. Tell him to have the Royal Family meet you at Swithburne Lake in the Magical North a week from today. Say you’ve hooked up with the Loyalist army.’

  She waited.

  ‘
Is there a Loyalist army?’ Elliot said. ‘I mean, I know there was a King’s army, and security forces, and, I don’t know, Central Intelligence. What’s happened to them all?’

  ‘They’re scattered,’ Mischka told him. ‘Many are with the Elite, some have joined us. A handful have gone underground and are working with Loyalists like your parents to reinstate the Royals. They have no hope. If they attempt an uprising, they’ll be brutally crushed. Once we take the Royals out of the equation, we save these people’s lives. We also take the first step towards democracy.’

  Elliot hesitated.

  ‘All we’re doing is sending them back to the World,’ she said. ‘All of them this time. They’ll forget who they were. They’ll make new lives. We’ll give them passports and money. They’re a deeply flawed family, but they’re going to be fine. Once they’re gone, your parents will be safe. And we can get to the real work of taking down the J.E. Elite and establishing a democratic Kingdom. A Kingdom without poison.’

  He made the call.

  *

  A few days later, Mischka was back again, this time telling Elliot to pack for a road trip. ‘We need you to come along. Princess Ko knows you. She’ll see you on the lake shore. She’ll bring the family right to you. I step out and take them to the World. Simple.’

  ‘But how do we know they’re coming?’ Elliot asked. ‘Shouldn’t I call Gabe again and find out?’

  Mischka shrugged. ‘We don’t know. Most probably, they won’t. No doubt they’re suspicious of your call. But calling again would be a mistake. It would confirm any suspicions they might have. So. We go. We check. I’ve got people to see on the way, so it’s no sweat. It’ll be a road trip. Let’s get moving.’

  Half an hour later, and for the third time since his arrival, Elliot was walking through the exit door and into the cavern of Greys.

  3

  Mischka’s car was the latest model Marsdon Tianna. It was fitted with transparent shutters and a sleek stereo. They stopped right away for gas, and Mischka bought bottles of soda and bags of candy.