The Eye of the North

by Sinead O'Hart

  “People?” said Dr. Bauer, straightening. Emmeline pricked up her ears and paid close attention, all the while pretending to be slumped in the chair, bored out of her mind.

  “Sir—people, and they’ve got fires, and all sorts—”

  “Fine! Enough! You and you, take Miss Widget and bind her securely, and have her brought up on deck. This instant!” As soon as these words had been spoken, Emmeline sat up, shrugging her upper body out of her blanket, and grabbed the handle of the empty—but still heavy—tankard. Then, as quickly as she could, she caught a handful of the blanket and casually draped it over her tankard-holding arm. Finally she rose to her feet, hoping nobody could see her quivering knees, and took a couple of long steps into the center of the room.

  “Hey! Just a minute—” she shouted, but Dr. Bauer didn’t give her any space to finish her sentence.

  “You will do what you are told, young lady,” he said in a low, dangerous tone, “or face what will be severe consequences.” With that, he strode off down the corridor, one of the sailors hurrying along in front of him like dirt in front of an angry broom.

  “Now, young miss,” said the bigger of the two sailors that were left. “If you’ll stand still for me, just for a minute, while I tie this lovely soft rope round your pretty little wrists, we can be off.” Emmeline glared at him but said nothing as he smiled down at her like she was a simpering baby. It was a huge effort for her just to let him get closer, and closer, and closer, until—

  “I don’t think so,” she muttered. In one very smooth movement she threw the blanket off her arm and took aim with the tankard, smashing it into the side of the sailor’s head and knocking him out cold on the floor.

  “Oi!” yelled the second sailor, a man barely as tall as Emmeline herself, but at least as wide again across his middle. Huffing out a breath, he dropped to his knees beside his fallen friend. “Ambrose! Mate!” He stared at the side of the fallen Ambrose’s face, which was beginning to swell nicely. Quietly, and without any fuss, Emmeline picked up the soup bowl. Gently and silently she removed the spoon, weighing it carefully in her hand. Good, she thought.

  “You little brat! Jus’ wait till I show you…,” the second sailor growled, struggling to his feet. Before he’d quite managed it, Emmeline upturned the still-hot soup over his head, jammed the bowl down as hard as she could, and hit it with her fists. The steaming liquid poured around his ears and down his neck, and Emmeline was pretty sure she saw a hairy lump of meat slither down the back of his shirt. With a pop, the soup bowl finally slipped over the sailor’s eyes, where it stuck fast.

  “Ow!” he wailed.

  “I’m sorry,” said Emmeline truthfully. “But I can’t let you keep me here.”

  “But you ’eard the boss.” He grabbed hold of the rim of the soup bowl and tried to lever it off his head. “You’ve to go topside!” Thinking fast, Emmeline aimed the heavy silver spoon at the man’s kneecap and threw it. Her aim was good, and the spoon clattered off with an almighty crack. The sailor tumbled to the ground again with a howl, grabbing his leg with both hands.

  Emmeline quietly took the blanket and got a good, tight grip. Before she could talk herself out of it, she pulled it over the sailor’s head, including his fetching soup-bowl hat, and down over his arms. Quickly she hopped over his flailing, uninjured leg and tied the blanket in the best approximation of Twitchell’s constrictor knot that she could manage, hoping she’d remembered the diagram correctly. She placed her foot right in the center of his wide back and nudged him forward, as gently as she could without actually calling it a kick, until he lay on top of Ambrose’s unconscious form. He was too round and too wide to pick himself up again easily, just as she’d hoped.

  “Hello?” she called. “Can you breathe in there?”

  Words Emmeline couldn’t clearly hear but felt sure weren’t complimentary burst out of the blanket in a thunderous muffle. She patted the sailor on the back and sprang to her feet again, looking around the room—properly this time. She finally got the chance to examine the wall that had been behind her while she’d been perched in the high-backed chair.

  “Yes!” she whispered, grinning.

  Avoiding the trussed sailor’s still-thrashing legs, she made her way around to the back of the room. In one corner she saw a messy pile of coats, heavy-duty and designed for bad weather. The second she put her hand on them, a pungent smell of fish filled her nostrils, but she swallowed back her dislike and dug straight in. It didn’t take her long to find a warm one with a belt, which she could tie around herself in such a way that the coat was both secure and also shortened enough not to trip her. As she strapped herself up, her stomach yowled, contracting like a closing fist, but Emmeline knew she didn’t have time to stop and search for food.

  She hurried to a tall cupboard that was propped against the wall near the pile of coats. One of its doors was slightly ajar, and she wriggled her fingers into the gap. As hard as she could, she pulled at the door, which skreeeeked open slowly, and she peered inside. Fishing rods…broken fishing rods…reels…snares…On a shelf Emmeline found a tightly rolled coil of clear, flexible fishing line, which went straight into her pocket.

  “Heeelp!” roared the sailor, the unexpected sound making Emmeline jump. She glanced over and saw that the knot was beginning to loosen. His arms would be free before too long. Get out of here now!

  She scrambled over the arm of the chair again and swung herself down to the ground, landing neatly beside the still-unconscious Ambrose’s splayed fingers. Automatically she bent to pick up the rope he’d been carrying, which, she realized with a shudder, should have been tied around her wrists and ankles by now. A second’s work had it in her pocket. Then a flash of silver under the table caught her eye, and she bent quickly to grab the spoon. You never know, she thought, sliding it into her pocket beside the rope and the fishing line.

  “Well, goodbye, then,” she said, before turning and hurrying for the door.

  Growing up in Widget Manor had bestowed upon Emmeline some remarkable talents, including the ability to walk as silently as a fly and hold her breath far longer than a respectable young lady should, as well as reflexes faster than a whipcrack. However, in an entirely different environment—for, in truth, no matter how challenging Widget Manor had been to live in, after a while none of its secret traps had retained their secrecy—she was discovering that things didn’t come to her so easily. Another thing that wasn’t helping was the furry hood of her unfamiliar coat, which, no matter how often she shoved it back where it should be, kept deciding to flop down over her head at just the wrong moment.

  “Gah!” she whispered as the hood whopped down over her eyes yet again. Angrily she whipped it off and tried to peer around a corner. The boat was suspiciously quiet, she thought. Where was everyone? She crept down an empty corridor, keeping a close eye and ear out for anyone approaching.

  Then she heard something. Something huge.

  She tiptoed forward, her heart whooshing in her ears, her eyes open wide to catch every last droplet of light.

  She came to a ladder, bolted to a wall, and an open hatch above it.

  Carefully, slowly, and very, very quietly she began to climb.

  “Disband! Go home!” she heard a voice shout from somewhere beyond the hatch. The sound of it made her freeze on the ladder. “Do you hear me? I say, go home and let us disembark!”

  And then Emmeline heard the huge noise again and realized it was a crowd of people, all shouting at the same time. She couldn’t pick out any voices, or even any words, but she had a feeling she knew what was being said: Leave. We do not want you here.

  The air creeping down from the night outside was cold and crisp. Emmeline breathed deeply—it was like being cleaned out, she felt, like the air was scrubbing her out until she sparkled.

  Whomp. Her hood decided this would be a good moment to flip down again. She raised an impatient hand and flipped it back before stretching herself to her full height and straining to se
e.

  Up at the front of the boat, she could barely make out some shapes that had to be Dr. Bauer and most of the sailors. Beyond their heads all she could see was a dull orange glow, like that thrown off by a huge fire.

  “Interesting,” she muttered, and quickly pulled herself up the rest of the way. Keeping low, she cleared the hatch and scurried around to the side of the boat.

  She found a secure-looking nook. Nestling herself between some discarded sacking and a pile of old packing crates, she finally got a chance to have a proper look at what was waiting for Dr. Bauer on the shoreline of this strange new country.

  No wonder he wasn’t happy, she thought.

  A sound caught Thing’s ear like a hook catching a fish.

  “Oi,” he said, his voice low. “Psst! You lot!”

  “What?” said Edgar irritably.

  “Cops!” Thing’s eyes, wide and red-rimmed, flicked toward the front door of 224 rue du Démiurge. “We’ve gotta clear out of here!”

  “I don’t hear anything,” mumbled Sasha, her face soft and puffy in the candlelight. Her hair was coming undone, and her cheek was covered in deep creases where she’d fallen asleep on her folded arms.

  “I don’t hear anythin’ neither,” muttered Thing. “I just know they’re comin’.”

  “But how is that even—”

  “Don’t question it, mate. It’s an instinct, right?”

  “Madame?” asked Edgar. “What do you think?”

  Madame Blancheflour turned to Thing and regarded him quietly for a few seconds. “I do not think they are police,” she said. “They are henchmen of the North—thugs in the pay of Bauer, would be my guess. But the boy is correct about one thing—they are coming.”

  “Well—yeah! Told yer! Get a move on, yeah?” Thing stood up from the table, scraping the chair legs against the stone floor. In a panic, he started trying to stuff Madame Blancheflour’s plates and cutlery into his seemingly bottomless pockets while his eyes scanned the room, looking for escape routes.

  “Thing! Thing!” Edgar called. “Calm down!”

  “Calm down? Calm down? Are you jokin’? How are we goin’ to help Ems if we’re locked up?”

  “Put back Madame’s belongings, please,” instructed Edgar in a quiet voice, keeping his eyes on Thing’s. Thing looked down at his hands and seemed amazed to find them full of dirty silver cutlery, and he was even more shocked to realize he’d shoved a plate into the pocket on the left leg of his overalls, and several more into the one on the right.

  “Sorry—sorry, Madame,” he mumbled, placing everything back on the table as carefully as he could. “I’ll—I can wash ’em for yer, if ya like.” He tried to polish one of the knives with his sleeve but realized after a few seconds that he was only making things worse.

  “Non, mon cher,” Madame Blancheflour said with a smile. “Not necessary. Now—are we going to listen to this wise child and get moving, or are we going to waste time talking nonsense, like adults? Alors!”

  “But we can’t just go—what about the plan? The others?” Sasha had two spots of red high up on her cheeks, making her look like a doll in a shop window.

  “There is, how do you say, a shortage of choices at the moment, ma chérie,” said Madame Blancheflour. As she spoke, Thing noticed her reach under her kitchen table, where, after a few seconds of searching, she seemed to find whatever she was looking for. A satisfied expression settled over her face.

  “Now. Go! Take what you can—food, mais oui. But you must leave!”

  “What about you?” asked Thing, already wrapping up a small loaf of bread and shoving it into a handy pocket. “Ain’t you comin’?”

  “At my age? Non. I have never been a fan of ice and snow. I will stay here, with the house, until your safe return—until all of you return safely.”

  “But we can’t leave you here!” said Edgar, shrugging into his jacket. “Please, Madame. I offer you my personal—”

  “Ça suffit, Edgar. You have a larger duty now. And besides—I am not without my own means of self-protection.” With a jerk of her skinny frame, she pulled something free from beneath the kitchen table. When her hand reemerged, it was clutching a gun so large and so well polished that the sight of it knocked every single thought out of Thing’s head.

  “Madame!” breathed Sasha. “I thought you didn’t approve of weapons!”

  “There is a time for diplomacy,” said Madame Blancheflour in a quiet and definite tone, “and there is a time for force. We passed the time for talking long ago.”

  Thing glanced at his friends as he looped Emmeline’s satchel across his body. Sasha’s eyes glittered with tears, which she blinked back as Thing watched, and Edgar’s face was dull with something like sorrow.

  Sasha shook her head, just once, and clapped her hands. “Right, then,” she said, her voice tight and her eyes dry. “Let’s get moving! Coats, food, whatever we can carry. Come on!”

  Just as Sasha was tying the belt of her coat, and Edgar was filling an old food sack with some meat, a few apples, and a couple of half-finished loaves of bread, there was a noise—barely there, but a noise all the same.

  This time they all heard it. Everyone’s eyes slid to Thing, and he nodded slowly.

  It was the sound of a heavy boot being placed carefully—but not, as it turned out, quite carefully enough—onto the top step, just outside the front door.

  “You will leave! You will go!” Emmeline couldn’t see the speaker on the ice, but whoever it was felt strongly enough to make the words heard over the crowd.

  “Oh, please!” shouted Dr. Bauer. “You have no idea what I’m even here for. When I’m successful, your country—such as it is—will be the first to benefit!”

  “No! We know exactly why you are here! What you’re doing is foolish. The Creature must not be woken!”

  Emmeline strained her eyes, trying to make out individual faces. The boat wasn’t quite in port yet—people with long poles, tipped with balls of fire inside metal cages, were standing guard over the harbor, refusing to let it dock. A huge bonfire burned behind them, throwing smoke and strange shadows up into the oddly greenish air. Behind the crowd and the leaping fire, Emmeline could see darkness, softly rolling, that seemed to go on forever.

  “What Creature?” called Dr. Bauer. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m here for the scenery!”

  Another voice rang out. “Do you think you’re the first to come up here and try to rouse it?” The speaker was a woman, and her voice was as clear as the stars overhead. “You’re not, you understand? There have been fools before you, and no doubt there’ll be several more after you’re long turned to dust.”

  “That, my dear woman, will never happen,” replied Dr. Bauer, his voice dripping with malice. “I have no intention of ever becoming dust, so let that put your mind at rest.”

  “Then you admit it? You admit you are here to rouse the Creature from its rightful resting place?” The woman turned to the crowd, raising her hand above her head. “He admits it!” They roared in response, shaking their flaming sticks and waving their fists at the boat and all its occupants.

  “I admit nothing!” shouted Dr. Bauer, but his voice was drowned out by the cries of the people. Emmeline shrank back, afraid, into her hiding place. She wasn’t sure what to do next, and she didn’t like that feeling.

  Make a plan, she told herself, thinking quickly. Mum and Dad are in the ice, he said. I’m never going to find them if I stay here. I have to go and look. I need to get off this boat!

  The next thing Emmeline knew, something whizzed by her head and landed with a thud on the pile of sacking beside her, where it jerked once or twice before coming to rest. Emmeline studied it intently, trying to see through the gloom, holding her breath as recognition bloomed inside her head.

  She figured out two things simultaneously: the first, that this strange object was a grappling hook, and the second, that she needed to move, right now. She started to get to her feet in a burst of
electric energy.

  But she was—just barely—too late.

  Thing placed a finger on his lips and glared at Edgar and Sasha. Madame Blancheflour slowly and carefully pulled back the hammer on her gun. It made a tiny click, but that couldn’t be helped.

  “There is a back door,” she whispered, her words more breath than sound. “Get to it, mes chers, and I will see to the rest.” She aimed her gun directly at the front door, straight down the hallway, and Thing noticed there wasn’t so much as a hint of trembling in Madame Blancheflour’s hands.

  “You’ve used a gun before, ain’t ya,” he whispered back, a grin in his voice. Madame Blancheflour didn’t answer, but she didn’t need to.

  “Behind Edgar, there is a doorway,” she said. “Go through it, and you will find a short corridor with a door at the end. It might stick a little, but it will open. When you are outside—run! You hear? Run, and do not separate yourself from the others.”

  “Bye, Madame,” he said, laying his hand gently on the old lady’s arm. “And thanks.”

  “Au revoir, mon cher. Bon courage,” she said with a wink. Thing turned to Edgar and Sasha, who were poised by the doorway, ready to fly. Sasha gestured to him while looking urgently at Edgar, whose gaze was trained on the front door. Thing had just started to move when a yell came from outside the house—a yell that sounded like “This is it!” Madame Blancheflour tightened her grip on her gun, and Thing dived for the doorway as Edgar tossed him the bag of food. Thing caught it, clutching it close to his chest.

  “Go!” whispered Edgar, his voice hoarse. “Sasha knows where she’s going. I’ll meet you there as soon as I can.”

  “But—we can’t leave you!” said Thing. “Madame said not to split up.”

  “Madame says a lot of things,” muttered Edgar. “But one thing I won’t have anyone say is that I left an old woman to defend herself, alone, against a bunch of mercenaries.”