by Alex Bell
Schmidt looked at him for a moment, an expression of pure hatred on his face until, making up his mind at last he said, ‘Try holding your breath for twenty seconds.’
Half suspecting that he was being made a fool of, Lex did as Schmidt had suggested. After exactly twenty seconds, the hat fell off.
‘You certainly didn’t get that from any book, Monty,’ Lex said quietly, letting out his breath in relief.
‘Go to hell,’ Schmidt hissed before stalking from the room and slamming the door behind him.
‘Not today,’ Lex murmured softly to himself as he replaced the silver hat back on the rack alongside the others.
The journey on board the enchanted ship continued on the basis of a kind of disgruntled, resentful truce between Lex, Schmidt, Lucius and the ferret. Lucius was exceedingly hurt over the whole nut-allergy affair and somehow managed to bring it up every time he saw Lex — which had not been often over the last few days for Lex spent little of his time on the bridge. He always took care to return at night, though. He knew well enough that the ship was not safe. He really had been joking when he told Lucius that he’d seen ghosts and lost, twisted children down below, but that joke backfired on him when he remembered it late at night and became extremely uncomfortable at the recollection of his own ghost stories.
He had gone out on deck one night with the intention of enjoying the air and the soothing sound of the ship cutting through the sea and the smell of the foam. But it had been unnaturally quiet for, of course, this was no ordinary ship — it flew, it did not sail and, as such, there was no sound of water, no white foam trailing in the ship’s wake. Nothing but a slightly unnatural silence. It was a warm night so Lex sat down with his back against the wall, looking out towards the prow. He could enjoy smelling the ocean on the sea breeze, even if he could not hear all that much of it. Lex had always loved ships, especially at night. They were their own little worlds, separate from everyone else, hidden away in the middle of the ocean.
He dug in his pocket for the crystal ball and re-watched the first round. It had been broadcast to the stadiums about an hour after it had actually been completed and now the footage was stored on their individual crystal balls so that they could watch it whenever they liked. Lucius had not watched it even once but Lex had seen it over and over again. It annoyed him that the footage of Lucius climbing the wall of the castle had been edited to look more impressive, with lots of nail-biting shots of how extraordinarily high they were, and all the parts where Lucius had complained, whined or wept had been cut altogether.
The Gods called the little crystal balls Divine Eyes and Lex therefore assumed that they somehow recorded what the Gods saw. After all, there were no cameras in evidence, following them about during the course of the Game, but the Gods had some way of watching everything that went on even though they weren’t physically there. It therefore seemed that, somehow, they also had a way of recording the images they saw so that they could be played back later.
The muted, tinny sound of glorious music came softly out of the little ball when it got to the part where Lex leapt out from behind the statues to freeze the medusa. He could imagine the music booming across the giant stadiums and the cries of awe from the spectators. The grand music, combined with lots of fearsome shots of both the medusa and the minotaur, as well as the fact that this part had been broadcast in slow motion, made the whole thing look even more dashing and courageous than it really had been.
‘It wasn’t as impressive as all that,’ Schmidt had snorted when he’d seen it.
‘That’s easy for you to say,’ Lex replied smoothly. ‘Seeing as you were the one cowering behind the statues whilst I was the one who heroically saved both our lives!’
To his immense satisfaction, Schmidt did not have anything to say to that. But Lex had taken to smugly watching and re-watching the footage in his crystal ball when he was alone late at night up on deck. He wanted to appear careless and nonchalant about it and felt that image would be somewhat ruined if the others saw him vainly ogling himself in the ball over and over again.
Lady Luck had smugly told him that he was the favourite to win already, with both Lucius and the prophet trailing far behind him. The defeat of the medusa and minotaur had created quite a stir and, already, enterprising merchants had produced a limited edition action figure of Lex fighting the monsters. The Goddess had brought him one in delight when she visited the ship yesterday. Lex took the three figures out of his pocket and examined them in the moonlight. Action-figure Lex did not look all that much like him as he was practically the same size as the minotaur — tall and broad and with a brave, fearsome expression on his little plastic face. Lex didn’t mind, however. You knew you’d made it when they turned you into an action figure.
He put them all back in his pocket and gazed out over the dark sea, feeling well pleased with himself. Look at me now, Gramps, he thought. This would be an adventure worthy of your stories. Lucius’s news that Alistair Trent was dead hadn’t particularly saddened Lex for he had known that it must have happened by now and he also knew that his grandfather would have wanted it. He was not a man made for half-lives. He had been a respected Chronicler and had only given it up when he had come home to raise Lex and Lucius after their parents died.
‘Sorry we cut your adventures off short, Gramps,’ Lex had said one day when he’d been about six. ‘You’d have had loads more without us.’
‘Well… some things are more important,’ Alistair replied lightly, running a hand through his thick silver hair as he sat down on the bench. He’d been chopping wood for the last hour but Lex had just brought him a tankard of beer, so he was having a well-earned break.
‘I want to be a Chronicler one day,’ Lex said.
‘Oh no,’ Alistair replied with a smile, picking Lex up with his strong hands and putting him on his knee. ‘You’ll be an Adventurer yourself. Don’t settle for writing the story, Lex. Accept nothing less than actually being the story and maybe one day The Chronicles of Lex Trent will be on the bookshelves next to Adventurers I wrote about myself.’
Lex had almost squirmed with pleasure at the suggestion. ‘You said it takes a certain type of person to be an Adventurer,’ he prompted, hoping for further praise.
‘Yes. You need certain qualities.’ Alistair glanced at his grandson. ‘But you’ve got most of them in spades already, which is damned remarkable considering you’re still only a little sprat. I’m completely confident that you’ll do the Trent name proud one day, my boy… ’
After a while, Lex fell asleep. He started awake some time later feeling cold and stiff and, for a moment, unsure of where he was. Then he remembered and was suddenly filled with the desire to get down below with Schmidt and Lucius where there were warm furs and the comforting sounds of other people breathing. He was about to stand up when he noticed the creature moving about on the deck. It was a moon-goblin — a strange, thin, melancholy creature made from moonlight. Lex froze, hoping the thing hadn’t seen him. Although mostly harmless, moon-goblins could be dangerously unpredictable when they were upset. This one was crying, wandering morosely about the deck, gazing out at the black sea, staring up at the stars and then wandering about again. Lex could hear its muffled sobs as it shuffled around. No one knew why the moon-goblins were such a sad species or what it was they cried about. This one had probably had its curiosity roused at the sight of the enchanted ship flying over the ocean. After a few minutes, it climbed over the outer railings, let go, and was blown away by the wind. Lex lost no time in scrambling to his feet and getting off the deck and back to the bridge as fast as he could, doing his best not to think about lost, twisted children.
It was with relief that he slipped into the bridge, firmly closing the door behind him. The light from the stars and moon shone in through the panoramic windows and illuminated Schmidt, Lucius and the ferret curled up in the warm blankets that had been piled around on the floor. As soon as Lex stepped into the room, Lucius sat bolt upright. ‘Is that
you, Lex?’ he whispered fearfully.
Lex cursed inwardly. He knew he’d been quiet. Still, at least Lucius had had the sense to whisper — the last thing he wanted was for Schmidt to wake up and start telling everyone off.
‘Of course it’s me,’ Lex said quietly, tiptoeing over to his own designated sleeping space beside Lucius.
‘Where were you?’ Lucius asked. ‘I was worried about you when you didn’t come back. I thought something might have happened. I thought you might have had an accident or fallen overboard or-’
‘Gods, will you listen to yourself? You’re like an old woman! Shut up and go back to sleep.’
‘I suggested to Mr Schmidt that we make up a search party just in case something had happened to you,’ Lucius went on, unperturbed. ‘But he said that he would never be that lucky.’
Lex chuckled softly.
‘It’s not funny,’ Lucius said huffily.
‘Schmidt knows that I’m controlling the ship with the ivory Swann in the basin over there,’ Lex said nodding towards it. ‘So if the ship is still moving then that means that I am still alive and still on board, all right?’
‘Oh. All right, but I wish someone had told me before. Where is the ship going, anyway?’
Lex groaned softly. ‘Don’t you ever stop talking? You know where the ship is going; the Goddess of Luck said that her round would take place in the Golden Valley.’
‘Well, I don’t see what we can possibly do there,’ Lucius grumbled. ‘There’s nothing there but-’
‘ Wealth,’ Lex said gleefully.
When the Lands Above had at last washed its hands of royalty and the assassinations and bloody feuds that went with it, the last kings had gone to the Golden Valley, taking much of their acquired wealth with them. The western kings took horse-drawn carriages that stretched on for miles, journeying with them across the continent to the promised land where there would be no subjects baying for their blood and no relatives plotting to kill them. The eastern kings did much the same but for the fact that their carriages were pulled by elephants rather than horses. The kings had been allowed to take people with them but strangely they had all chosen to take servants rather than family. Kings had grown to be instinctively distrustful of relatives, especially since many of them had got their own titles by sneaking a drop of poison into Uncle’s brandy one night. So they took gold and servants instead of loved ones. It was said that the Golden Valley did now truly glitter, due to the amassed wealth of the land’s exiled kings.
‘I want to see that gold,’ Lex whispered. ‘It must be the most amazing sight.’
‘But it isn’t worth anything,’ Lucius grumbled. He pulled out a note of m-gold and held it up to the moonlight. ‘We use paper money, now.’
Lex snatched the note from him and examined it as best he could in the dark. Paper money! He sneered at the sight of it. What intrinsic worth did it have? What intrinsic beauty did it possess? There was nothing rare or unique about paper notes. Lex tossed it back to his brother dismissively.
‘And I thought people weren’t allowed to go there now, anyway,’ Lucius said.
‘The Gods want us to go,’ Lex said. ‘Isn’t that enough?’
‘Well, yes, I suppose. I’m glad to see you’ve maintained some respect for the Gods.’
Lex suppressed a smile. If Lucius could only hear how he spoke to Lady Luck when it suited him. Although, to be fair, he probably would not have tried it with any of the other Gods.
‘Go to sleep,’ Lex said. ‘We’ll get there tomorrow or the day after and I want to be ready.’
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE GOLDEN VALLEY
‘Rise and shine!’ Lady Luck exclaimed in a horribly cheerful voice for such an early hour.
Schmidt and Lucius were already awake from the sounds of things, but Lex was not a morning person and under normal circumstances would have buried his head under the pillow with a groan. But because he was currently in the middle of a Game he sat bolt upright and said, ‘It hasn’t started already, has it?’
‘No dear,’ Lady Luck replied. ‘There’s still another hour to go.’
‘Well then, what the heck are you waking me up for?’ Lex snapped. ‘I only need half an hour to get ready! I could have had a whole extra half hour of-’
‘You’ve made the headlines again, dear,’ the Goddess interrupted him. ‘I thought you might like to have a little gloat over breakfast.’
Lex saw that she was holding a newspaper out towards him and, because there was nothing he liked better than having a little gloat over breakfast, he snatched it from her eagerly, expecting to see something about the current Game. He was therefore surprised to see the headline: Shadowman Strikes Again!
At first he thought it must be something to do with the museum break-in back at the Wither City. But then he noticed the date printed at the top of the page and saw that this was not an old newspaper at all. In fact it had only been printed that very morning and was about a different theft altogether. It appeared that the famous Blue Diamond had gone missing from the jewel vault in one of the Bandy Towns, and Shadowman calling cards had been left at the scene of the crime. Lex stared at the page, dumbstruck and horrified.
Being the nosy snoops that they were, Schmidt and Lucius came over at once to peer over Lex’s shoulder at the front page. They both gave predictable, and rather irritating, gasps and then Schmidt said, in an outraged voice, ‘So that’s where you were when you went missing yesterday! Hand over that diamond, Lex, right this instant!’
‘I’d sooner give myself a lethal dose of poison than hand a precious diamond over to you!’ Lex snarled. ‘But, as it happens, I don’t have it. Which you would know if you had an ounce of common sense in your thick head!’
The Bandy Towns were on the edge of the Wild West and they boasted the most impressive collection of jewels anywhere on the planet (with the exception of the Golden Valley). They also happened to be about four thousand miles away.
‘How do you think I got there, eh? You must think I’m a truly awesome magician with spectacular, superhuman powers to be able to achieve such a magnificent feat! I suppose I should be flattered.’
‘All right, Lex,’ Lucius said, in what he obviously thought was a soothing manner. ‘There’s no need to be offended. You can’t blame Mr Schmidt for jumping to the wrong conclusion. After all, you have stolen things before, and even if you’ve turned over a new leaf now, you-’
‘I have not turned over a new leaf, you twit!’ Lex said, swatting Lucius’s hand away from where he’d been trying to pat him on the shoulder. ‘I am the Shadowman! I’m not upset because Schmidt thought this was my doing,’ — he waved the newspaper around — ‘I’m upset because it wasn’t!’ ‘You mean you didn’t steal the Blue Diamond?’ Lady Luck said, finally catching up with things.
‘No! Someone is impersonating me!’
‘Oh. Well, I suppose it’s natural to get copycats — after all, you are becoming quite notorious.’
‘But it’s my notoriety! How dare someone steal it like that?’
The irony of that sentence was not lost on Lex. But Schmidt looked very much like he was about to start pointing it out for the benefit of everyone present, so Lex screwed up the newspaper, threw it away from him and, before Schmidt could say anything, went to the window and said loudly, ‘Where the heck are we anyway?’
But as soon as he saw the sight below he needed no answer. Lady Luck gave him one anyway: ‘We’re in the Golden Valley.’
And Lex decided that resolving this Shadowman business would have to be postponed. In fact, he was already seeing how this could be of benefit to him. Presumably the authorities back at the Wither City would know that he was playing in a Game by now. And so he had an alibi for this most recent theft. He could once again deny being the Shadowman. The so-called ‘witness’ Schmidt had found would be discredited. Lex would say he fled the Wither City because he was scared of the upcoming trial, not because he was guilty as sin. Yes.. there might
just be a way out of this yet.
As soon as the Game was finished he would get stuck right back in with his thefts and his scams, but he would drop the Shadowman and come up with something else. A new name, a new identity and a better calling card next time — one that could not possibly be replicated by some contemptible copycat who wasn’t original enough to come up with his own alterego.
But for now all that could wait. He was in the Golden Valley. Finally he was going to see it with his own eyes. He left the others dawdling about in the observation room and legged it up to the deck.
Humans liked being kings for it made them feel closer to Gods. There had been a time, before the physical split of the Lands Above from the Lands Beneath, when humans all over the Globe had started proclaiming themselves as royalty, commanding over anyone who would listen and making their own crowns out of twigs and coloured glass and beads and anything else they could find. In the end, the Gods had been moved to put a stop to it. There could only be so many kings, they said. To limit the number, the Gods presented humanity with twenty crowns. Only the wearers of these twenty could be considered true kings — the missing link between divinity and humanity. And so the bloody battles commenced until the day when the kings were kicked out once and for all.
Lex had heard stories of these twenty crowns. His grandfather had even seen one once, from a distance. They were not made from gold, it was said, but from something even more beautiful. Just the joy of being able to brush one with his fingertips would have been immeasurable to Lex.
As an appreciator of beauty, it had always been Saydi’s sun that Lex had loved the most, for, as Goddess of Beauty, she was a deity after Lex’s own heart and she could do the most breathtaking wonders with her sun. Sometimes she cooled its rays enough for a soft, powdery snow to fall whilst the sky remained blue and bright, and at others she painted the sky with rainbows and golden-hued warmth or scented the air with honey and pollen and summer. Saydi seemed to understand that, in order for beauty to be appreciated in full, it must not impact on comfort and so her sun always heralded the most amenable weather on the Lands Above. There would never be any sunstroke or frostbite whilst Saydi’s sun was in the sky and Lex would have loved her for that alone. He recognised her sun as soon as he stepped out onto the deck of the enchanted ship on the morning they arrived at the Golden Valley. The air was clear and cool and beautifully fresh. It seemed incredibly sweet and oxygen rich — as to normal air what distilled spring water is to sewage. The gentle, golden light from the sun had liquefied in its purity and was splashing down upon the deck in soft smatterings of what the people knew as sun drizzle — a kind of golden rain that gently warmed the skin rather than wetting it.