by Philip Webb
Dad is proper riled now. But Gramps ain’t never one to back off from a scrap, certainly not in public, and certainly not with my dad. As far as he’s concerned, Dad, being from Gravesend, is an outsider – not a proper scav. Must have caused a few ructions when Dad tied the knot with his precious daughter. Plus there’s the small matter that Dad wasn’t on the shift when Mum died …
Gramps flobs a greenie onto the floor. “I know about the day-to-day like nobody else under this roof. That’s how these Russians keep us down – paying us just enough not to rebel, never enough to get ahead. But this was our city once. We should reclaim it. Those bones north of the river are our dead!”
Dad goes, “Still peddling the same old lines. Might be news to youngsters, but the rest of us have heard it all before. Think we’re stupid? Vlads have got all the guns and power. Reckon they’re gonna take notice of a rabble of scavs armed with kitchen knives and rocks?”
Dad and Gramps stand face-to-face for a few moments, breathless and seething. That silence says plenty – the bad blood between them ain’t exactly a secret. Wednesday meetings ain’t never been this riveting, ever.
Dad is the first to blink. He chucks his hands up and turns to the crowd. “What choice have we got? We can’t exactly down tools, can we? How do you think that would pan out? Reckon that’ll just give them the excuse they need to turn really nasty.”
“But what if we find the artifact before they do?” Gramps says. “We’d have the upper hand then. They’d have to settle with us. And we can find it, if we organize, if we’re clever, if we use our brains instead of our strength. We’re scavs, aren’t we? Rooting through this city is what we do best. But grinding every building down piece by piece isn’t the way to do it! There aren’t enough Vlads to police us if the men take to the tunnels and buildings north of the river. Send the women and children into the Wilds …”
“You’re crazy, old man!” cries Mabel. “We won’t survive five minutes up north! Berserker tribes, Blue-faces, Ferals!”
Gramps fixes her with a furious eye. “Those are just fireside stories. None of us really knows what’s outside of London …”
“I ain’t going nowhere Vlads are scared of going to!” another woman shouts.
“What about west, in the Waste Mountains?” goes one of Turnley’s sons. “I’ve heard the people there are like us, like scavs …”
“Mutants, more like!” puts in Mabel. “The dumping grounds of the world. Who’d want to scrape out a living there in all that filth? I’ll take my chances in London, thanks very much! Least the soil ain’t poison here.”
Fred Cowan the pigherd steps into the fray, and this is pretty strange, cos old Fred don’t say much to no one except his pigs. I never heard him pipe up at a meeting before. The hall goes quiet for him. He looks nervous as he speaks.
“We got to do something.”
Everyone waits.
“I saw things. Two nights back. Late, when folks was kippin’.”
“Prob’ly on the drink!” shouts someone. But there ain’t no one laughing.
Fred shakes his head slowly. “Light in the sky. Not copter or an airplane. Like furnace sparks comin’ fast. It went into the water ‘cross from Tower walls. Sploosh.”
“What was you doing up there?” goes Jacob Armitage, our preacher. “That’s miles away!”
Couple of folks snicker, but you can tell they ain’t that tickled.
Fred shrugs. “I just go where them pigs go.”
People start gabbling, but Jacob hushes them up. “Go on, Fred.”
“There’s bubblin’ and steam off the river. I wait a bit, but nothin’ comes up again. But then, on the north stump of the Tower Bridge, I see these soldiers comin’. They got search flashlights, but they ain’t no soldiers I seen before.”
“What do you mean?”
“They’re machine-men.”
“What?”
“They come out of Vlad trucks, but they was made of machines. Legs and arms like … scaffold. I don’t know.”
He hangs his head, and a few folks start laughing for proper now.
Gramps holds up his hand. “This is what I mean. The Vlads are losing patience, sending in new weapons. We’ve got to find the artifact a different way, then hand it over while we’ve still got the chance to salvage something of our lives.”
Mabel pipes up. “Come on! You just fed him that claptrap to back you up!”
A few murmurs of agreement.
Gramps whirls to face her and points a shaking finger. “Fred Cowan’s his own man. He’s got no reason to lie for me or anyone. I promise you, scavving will be the death of us. The sooner the Vlads get what they want, the sooner they’ll be gone from here. Think about it!” The sight of him hopping up onto a table hushes the crowd. “The artifact must have knowledge. Secrets from another age. And they won’t leave us in peace till it’s found.”
“Stories and rumors!” cries Dad. “You’ve looked for it so long you’re believing in your own made-up dreams! You don’t have any idea what this artifact is. No one does.”
“I know this much – it’s got a soul.”
Gramps lets that hang and no one breathes a word. But next to me, Wilbur begins to fidget.
Gramps looks around at us all, milking the moment. “It’s alive and it watches us.”
Gus takes center stage for the first time since the barney started. “Whatever the artifact is, I don’t care.” His voice is all shaky with feeling as he stares at Gramps. “We’ve survived as scavs for a hundred years – all this talk of change is madness. The Vlads will crush us if we throw down our tools and go looking for it alone.”
Nobody speaks for a few moments. Gus Turnley might be a coward, but he sums up the feelings of most people.
Gramps rounds on him in a fury. “Well, you’re a fool, Gus Turnley!” he spits. “Don’t you want to be free? We need to find the artifact before the Vlads, and there’s clues in this city, for those who care to look.”
Everyone starts putting in their two-pennyworth then, and crowding toward the chief’s barrel.
And that’s when Peyto stands up. I can’t believe it, cos youngsters ain’t supposed to do speaking at meetings.
He just walks into the center of the room and, in a clear voice, speaks out to everyone. “So, if the Vlads had the artifact,” he asks, “wouldn’t that just make them even more dangerous?”
A gobsmacked silence drops over the meeting house. It ain’t something I reckon anyone’s thought about. We’re so busy scavving all day every day, no one really thinks they’ll live to see the day it gets found.
Gramps leaps down from the table, his rags all flapping like crows’ wings.
“And who are you, young sir?” He jabs at Peyto. “Who are you – in our meeting hall? A stranger. Asking questions about the artifact …”
A few nasty murmurs bubble up from the crowd.
“A Vlad messenger maybe. Or a spy?”
I feel Erin start forward and I snatch her arm.
I keep my voice low. “Go to the well. It’s at the far end of the street.”
“But –”
“I’ll meet you there in a minute.”
She tries to read me, wanting to trust. But she ain’t sure.
“Go!” I hiss.
As soon as she turns for the door, I break toward the middle of the hall. It ain’t even like I’ve got a clear idea what I’m gonna do. All I know is, I’ve got to mix up some kind of trouble. Right now.
I leap onto the serving table, hurdle the hog spit, and charge toward the fire. At the far end of the table is a whopping great cauldron of water for the washing-up. I jump into the slide, feeling plates and knives skid out from under my buttocks. And wallop! Feetfirst into the cauldron. It takes about ten years to tip over, then a great wave of soapy water heaves into the flames. Steam rushes into the dark.
Just before it goes totally black, I eyeball Peyto, so I know exactly where he is as I grab hold of his hand – soft like no sca
v hand ever would be.
And I yank him through a circus of yelling and shoving. Through the door and out into the night.
THE FLINDER
We run, hand in hand, away from the hall, stumbling in the potholes. The well is just up ahead, and I can just make out Erin crouching in the shadows. We huddle down next to her, our breath smoking hot and fast.
Erin flashes Peyto a filthy look. “What were you thinking of? Things are bad enough as they are!”
“I’m sorry. I just wanted to know what they’d do if they really found it –”
“Haven’t we got enough to worry about without the whole village chasing after us? We have to go, right now.”
“Settle down,” I go. “You ain’t in danger. Things’ll blow over. They ain’t a bad lot, trust me.”
Erin pulls away. “You don’t understand, Cass. We have to go.”
“We can’t. It’s far too dangerous –” starts Peyto.
“We can’t leave it there,” cries Erin. “We’ve got days, Peyto! Days! Not weeks! And now you’ve gone and lost –”
“Calm down, I haven’t lost it. I know exactly where it is. At least I found Wilbur – he was right where he was supposed to be.”
“You don’t know if he’s definitely The One.”
“Wait a second – what about Wilbur?” I go. “He’s the one what?”
But they’re so mad with each other, they ain’t listening.
“It’s all right for you,” goes Erin. “If the ship crashes, it’s not your family …”
Peyto leaps up. “Don’t you ever say that – that it’s all right for me!”
Erin’s pacing about now, fit to explode. “Tell him! Tell him he’s got to listen!” she pleads to me.
“Whoa!” I go. “Rewind! Lost what? What ship? What’s too dangerous? And what’s this about Wilbur? You knew he was gonna be at Big Ben?”
Peyto slumps against the edge of the well. “There was meant to be someone at the clock tower – someone to … help us. Wilbur was there. He has to be The One. He came there to look for the artifact of his own accord. It makes sense.”
“OK, look, you’ve got that wrong,” I go. “Wilbur ain’t got no more clue where the artifact is than any other scav. He’s just a kid with bonkers ideas, all right? He’s had more guesses where the artifact is than he’s had hot dinners. And they’ve all been dead ends, believe me. It’s a game for him. Anyway, who told you there’d be someone at the clock tower?”
“It’s a long story,” mutters Peyto, looking away from me. “There’s something we need to find. And there’s someone we need to find, too … a woman.”
I want to ask him how come this is all connected to the artifact when he didn’t know naff all about it at Big Ben, but he’s closed off from me, still seething at Erin.
“The point is, we’re in even more trouble now,” goes Erin, glaring back at him.
I glance between them. “Why?”
“I left something back where we were scavving,” mumbles Peyto.
“So? Get it tomorrow.”
“You don’t understand. I had to leave it there or the Vlads would have found it when I got scanned at the end of the shift …”
I shake my head. “Ain’t you had enough for one day? I told you already. We ain’t allowed that side of the river till it’s been cleared. They see you, they shoot you.”
“I’m going,” says Erin, and she means it.
I backpedal in front of her, trying to smile. “Slow down, lady! You ain’t even gonna make it across the river.”
Her eyes sparkle with tears as she tries to look through me, all hell-bent on marching to the edge of the world. At last she stops and hangs her head.
“Bejeepers, and I thought Wilbur was stubborn! What’s going on today? What’s so precious you can’t just pick it up tomorrow?”
And that’s when Erin brings something out from under her collar.
It’s such a shock, I figure I’m dreaming as she cups it in her hand to show me. First off I think it’s an animal. Long tentacles, thin as fishing wire, are waving about where it was clasped around her neck, and then they just disappear into the rest of it, like when you touch the stalks on a snail. It ain’t much bigger than a chestnut shell, but it’s an odd shape, a sort of knot with bulges and stalks and creases. And it’s glowing with the faintest of lights – a shimmer of faraway blue and green, with hairline streaks of cream drawn across its surface in patterns, like the grain of bleached wood. Except it’s much finer than that – all the detail is sharp and layered and sunk down deep inside. And as I gaze at it, I could swear them patterns are moving about, very slowly shifting and mixing. It’s the most weirdest, most stand-out beautiful thing I’ve ever clapped my eyes on.
“What … on Earth … is … that?”
“It’s a flinder,” says Peyto. “Erin’s got one and I’ve got one – that’s what I had to leave on the other side of the river. But there are others, and … well, one of them is lost. Here. In this city. We think. I don’t know what the Vlads are looking for, but this missing flinder, it could be your artifact.”
Gently, almost reluctantly, Erin hands it to me.
And as soon as I touch it, I know. This is what we’re all looking for. The artifact is a flinder, just like this one.
I think about what Wilbur said – If you hold it, you’ll know …
It feels like … a sleeping heart, filled with wrestlings and yearnings, sparking out echoes that snatch away before I can hold them. Like the scraps of dreams when you wake up. Like ghosts stirring, flinching from my touch. I come back to the here and now slowly, flutters in my skin. The stalks unfurl again, like moth feelers, gently reaching out to touch my fingers.
“So, will you help us?” asks Erin at last.
Her manner ain’t pleading – she just lays it down like the quietest of challenges.
I don’t say nothing, and I can see her sucking in her temper, then writing me off. She takes the flinder back.
I feel suddenly lost, like the thing’s swiped a warm bit of my soul. The tentacles reach out to embrace her.
Up the street I see the meeting breaking up – everyone standing in huddles arguing. We can’t stay here. Awkward questions are coming our way …
But you know, I’ve seen crews march out of buildings just cos the floorboards creak a certain way, and ten minutes later the whole street comes crashing down. It’s that feeling that bugs me now – my scav nose for trouble. And what else? It spins in my head like the beacon on a moving crusher. I could take it, this flinder. I could give it to the Vlads and maybe they’d just pack off home and leave us in peace. It’s what Gramps would do. Peyto looks uneasily to the ground. He knows what I’m thinking.
But it ain’t as simple as that, is it? Cos I ain’t gonna sell them out after what’s happened today, am I? Thing is, these two strangers from who-knows-where are both ready to lay down their lives rather than lose their flinders. Question is, why?
Just right then, Erin puts on her kiddie earmuffs, like she’s shutting me out, moving on. And they’d be ridiculous on anyone else, but somehow she carries them off, cos she ain’t got a clue that they’re in any way wrong. She don’t even know they was meant for little girls. To her they’re just ear cozies. And that’s when I warm to her. So I smile.
“I must be bonkers, like I ain’t already had a gutful of trouble today. But I suppose you’d better count me in.”
Out the corner of my eye I spot Wilbur trotting up toward us, and I hiss at Erin to tuck her flinder away.
“We’ll have to start pretty soon,” I go. “It’ll take us at least an hour to reach the river even if we go in the cart. Don’t ask me how we’re gonna get across the water, but we’ll figure something out.”
I listen to myself as I’m whispering all this, and I can’t believe it’s coming out my mouth.
“Cass, what’s going on? You’re planning something!”
Sharp as a tack, my little brother.
“W
hat makes you say that?” I go, all casual.
“I can always tell. Just the way you poke your tongue in your cheek when you’re thinking hard.”
There ain’t no point in trying to deny it. I make my mind up right there to include him, else he’ll just blab something to Dad. But there ain’t no way I’m gonna let on any more than I need to, least till I figure out just how dangerous this whole escapade is. When in doubt, orders.
“Right, Wilbur. Listening? Go and fix up Sheba to the cart, and do it nice and quiet. Meet us up at the head of the north track in ten minutes. Make sure no one sees you. And, Wilbur? You goof and we’re gone without you, all right?”
He scampers away toward the animal sheds.
My head’s going frantic with the details. Course, I suppose I could still bail out. But somehow, now I’ve taken charge, I know that ain’t gonna happen.
“Thank you, Cass,” Erin goes at last.
“Not a word about any flinder malarkey to him, yeah? Kid’s got enough spooky ideas as it is, and I don’t want him getting hurt, all right? But listen up, I swear to God, when this is over tonight, you tell me the whole shebang. Agreed?”
Peyto smiles. “Agreed.”
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF LOOTERS
Wilbur shows up on the nose of ten minutes, and we all clamber into the back of the cart. By now I’ve figured what to say to my brother about the mission. His excited little face is hanging on my every word.
“Now, listen up. Peyto’s gone and dropped his cash bag on the job and we’re gonna get it back.”
Wilbur searches my eyes. “How come we don’t just get it tomorrow?”
“Cos it’s too risky! It’s everything they’ve got, and if we ain’t careful, some nosy gangmaster rooting about first thing’s gonna snaffle it up.”
He nods, but I can tell he’s seeing right through me and out the other side. Cos Peyto and Erin ain’t the sort to even have a cash bag. They’ve never grafted for money their whole lives. Still, Wilbur takes it on board, even gives me a cheesy grin.
So I gee up Sheba and we’re off. It’s a windy night with no clouds to spoil the moon. The stars swim and hover when you squint at them, like the sparkles of coins at the bottom of our well. But I clock that Peyto and Erin ain’t interested in any of that. They spend the journey glued to Sheba’s swaying flanks, the flick of her tail, her wheezy progress along the north track. At one point, Erin reaches out and touches the old nag’s rump – just gently, like a kid does. Sometimes in the distance we can make out other villages – huddles of lamplight and the faint burble of people rabbiting. No one says a word. There’s something about this caper that makes me think it’s just a game – that we’ll only get as far as Blackfriars or one of the other bridges, and it’ll dawn on us that it’s nuts to go any farther.