by Gill, J. G.
“Where’re we going?” I said.
“You’ll see. It’s where Troy and I used to hang out most when we first got together.”
As I followed Calix down the hall, my eyes sneaked snapshots of the various other passageways and halls that seemed to sprout off in random directions. Now and then I’d catch snippets of laughter or conversation, as we passed by another room where people were lying about on mattresses, talking.
“Do people live down here permanently?” I said.
“Yeah, some do,” said Calix. “They put showers and flushing toilets in here when it was used as a bunker. For some reason the authorities have never thought to turn off the water supply. I think they just forgot about this place altogether. It’s amazing, the water’s hot too, from the homemade generators.”
Suddenly, I noticed that the passage had started to slope downwards and that Calix was now walking down a flight of rickety metal stairs. As I peered over her head I could see a brick archway at the bottom. She stepped through it and turned right onto a narrow strip of flat ground. Grabbing the handrail, I quickly ran after her, my boots clacking loudly against the metal steps. As I reached the final step I could see that the strip was in fact some sort of platform, the kind you’d find at a railway station. To my right, the platform was met by a solid white wall, while to my left, at the far end of the platform, the wall had a large arch in it, leading into a tunnel. Calix was standing next to a group of bodies lying huddled in sleeping bags against the wall nearest us. Directly in front of me, I could see several twenty-four gallon drums balancing on the rusty train tracks just below the platform, their steel bellies glowing with fire. A small crowd of people were clustered around each of them, warming their hands, lighting tobacco, and browning sausages on skewers. Grey smoke billowed out over the tracks and rolled down the tunnel in thick waves.
“This is it,” said Calix proudly. “The old part of the underground train system they never ended up using. It was built at the very beginning, as an extension to the Ante-Book line, but the engineers realised that the whole thing would flood if the banks of the river ever breached, so they canned it. The Governors of Wiltsdown tried to hush it up because it cost so much money. But people still heard rumours about it, mainly from the guys who did the digging. So, that’s how we ended up with our very own underground system!”
“Hey, you two, fancy a sausage?” a voice cut in. We turned to see a man near one of the drums holding out two skewers towards us.
“Offer it to all the girls do you mate?” one of his friends called out, as a bunch of others laughed sleazily.
“Ignore them,” said the first man. “You two look hungry.”
I glanced nervously at Calix. She knew these guys, I didn’t. Her eyes shifted from the sausages, to the man’s face, then back to the sausages, as if taking readings on his character.
“Yeah, why not?” she said finally. “I’m always happy to stop food going to waste.” She leant forward and took the skewers, handing me one of the charred offerings. “Thanks,” she said to the man.
We wandered back to the rows of sleeping bags and found a spare section of the wall. I leant against it, sliding down until my butt hit the concrete. Calix sat down next to me. We were both so busy gnawing at our food that it was several minutes before either of us spoke. I watched as a tall, thin man wearing threadbare, fingerless gloves warmed his hands over one of the smouldering drums. He had olive skin and a pale scar that gouged a track through his cheek. Rubbing his hands together for one final time he suddenly started walking towards us.
“Hey guys, chop, chop, time to work,” he called to the sleeping bags. A couple of them groaned.
“Not that time already is it Legs?” said one of the bags.
“’Fraid so, Marty,” the man called back.
The sleeping bag rustled and heaved and an elbow made a momentary triangle in its side before a man’s head popped out of one end. He yawned and rubbed his eyes.
“Pass me a sausage would you, Legs?” he said to the tall man.
Legs grabbed a skewer from the side of the drum, checked to make sure the sausage was cooked, and handed it to the man in the sleeping bag.
“You need to get your mate up,” said the thin man, pointing to one of the sleeping bags. The man called Marty gave the bag a hefty nudge.
“Move it bones,” he said. The sleeping bag spasmed, then lay still again.
“Try him again,” said Legs. Marty shoved the sleeping bag again and it let out a loud groan.
“He’s got two minutes Marty. Otherwise he’s off the job tonight and he can go without food until tomorrow.”
Marty shrugged himself from his sleeping bag and stood up. He was already fully dressed in jeans and a denim jacket. Legs threw him a balaclava.
“It’s cold out, you’ll need it,” he said.
Marty pulled the woollen mask down over his face and gently rolled the sleeping bag next to him with his foot. The bag groaned again, but this time the protest was even louder than before.
“Leave him Marty, he’ll be back as soon as he’s hungry.” said Legs.
Marty jumped down off the platform and began walking with Legs into the tunnel. The sleeping bag rustled again and a head popped out. It had a mop of shaggy dark hair and there were cuts all over its face. Calix gasped in shock.
“Troy!”
CHAPTER XXV
Hester puffed her feathers and hunkered down as low as she could get in the eaves, trying to keep warm. The wind had grown much stronger since Min and Thomas had left and was now lifting the dust from the ground, swirling it about in great blue clouds so the earth looked as if it was steaming. Hester buried her beak further into her creamy-coffee breast feathers, her eyes squinting to shut out the dust.
Another ten minutes passed, then fifteen. After twenty minutes, Hester was beginning to sense that something had gone seriously wrong. She extracted her beak from her chest, gave her feathers a good shake and stretched her wings. It was time to get help. As she launched herself from her perch, the feathers on her head flattened instantly against her skull, the headwind pushing her backwards as if sparring for a fight. Hester paused, took a deep breath, and set off again, determined to conquer the wind. Every wing beat felt as heavy and laboured, as if she was flying through thick mud, and by the time she finally reached the outer suburbs of Wiltsdown her body felt leaden. She willed herself to keep going, just a bit longer, just until she reached the Cathedral and could get help.
In the distance, the spire of St Bartholomew’s dominated the skyline like a lighthouse in a sea of treacherous roofs. Hester kept it fixed firmly in her sights as she flitted down the streets, darting from building to building and resting momentarily on the odd windowsill. Soon she could see the individual panels of the Cathedral’s silvery-blue metal dome glinting in the moonlight. She approached it cautiously. Despite being tiny and able usually to slip by unnoticed, she knew that this time was different – she had Demarge’s scouts to worry about or, worse still, Demarge himself.
Hester circled the dome, once, twice, looking for a discreet point at which to enter. Eventually she saw it, a small window high in the front of the Cathedral. As she drew closer she was relieved to find that the window was slightly ajar, the safety catch set just far enough for a bird to squeeze through. She landed, her toenails scratching the metal frame of the window, and peered inside. She was now perched immediately behind the organ, the coppery-gold pipes soaring skyward above her. Far below, she could see a large, black marble star spanning the floor of the Cathedral. It glowed softly in the moonlight.
Hester gazed around at the vast, empty void. Everything was perfectly, eerily still. Not even the hint of a breeze dared to bother the heavy velvet drapes that hung on either side of the far windows. Hester’s target shone luminously in the darkness – the white marble square of the doorway to the Murmuring Gallery. She just had to reach it without being seen. Quickly scanning the room for shadows lurking in the corners, she
began to plot a route. Flying anywhere near the windows was obviously out – the light would reveal her silhouette in a second. As the light played across the mosaic floor, she quickly isolated the darkest areas of the room, joining them together in her head like a dot-to-dot puzzle. She figured that she would need to break up the trip into two parts: the first flight would take her to the edge of a large painting where the frame met the darkness of the drapes and the second would transport her to the doorway itself.
Hester stretched her wings, allowing the wind to gently lift her off the sill. She hovered for a second, waiting for a further gust, then glided soundlessly towards the painting, flexing her toes as she prepared to dig them into the edge of the canvas. Her feet found their mark, clipping the gilt frame as she landed.
Almost there, she reassured herself. Not far now.
Suddenly, something stirred below. A tall figure dressed in black emerged from the darkness and glanced up pointedly at the painting, the whites of his eyes gleaming like moonstone.
Hester recognised Demarge instantly. Inhaling sharply, she drew back into the darkness of the drapes. Every muscle in her body, every sinew, tensed with the fear that she’d been seen. After what seemed like an age, Demarge’s gaze slowly shifted away towards the windows. Hester sighed with relief – she hadn’t been seen after all. Her relief quickly turned to dismay though, as Demarge strode towards the staircase leading to the Murmuring Gallery. The sound of his heels clipping the marble steps reverberated inside her.
No! she screamed inside her head.
Getting back to the Slipworld had just become infinitely more difficult. Unless she could get past Demarge, Hester knew it would be impossible to get back to the Slipworld. She was paralysed with indecision: should she follow Demarge into the stairwell, or wait until he’d left? Every passing second was another moment lost to helping Min and Thomas. Hester knew had no choice – she had to get up the stairwell immediately.
Prising herself free from the picture frame, Hester flew as quietly as she could to the entrance to the Murmuring Gallery. She hid behind a large ornamental acorn at the far end of the mantel and listened for sounds coming from the stairwell. Everything was preternaturally still. Demarge had to be up there, but where? Hester knew she had to draw him back down into the atrium if she had any chance of getting past him. She took a deep breath and chirped loudly.
For a second, nothing moved. Then, suddenly, Hester was blinded by a flash of light, as something snapped at the air like a whip. The smell of burning feathers told her she’d been hit. She ducked, just as a second bolt of light came hurtling towards her It looped around the acorn like a lasso, then snapped back on itself, tearing the ornament clean from the mantel. Now all that stood between Hester and the tall figure was a wounded piece of marble, the raw stump glistening whitely.
Hester flung herself at the entrance to the stairwell, a searing pain biting into her wing. As she careered around the spiralling staircase, the pain grew more and more intense, dragging her wing down like a weight. She was soon flying so lopsidedly that she looked more like she was limping in mid-air, rather than actually flying.
“So, I see Morana’s plan has worked,” said Demarge, striding after her. “The Aeons future now relies entirely on a sparrow. Well, sparrow, you can show me into the Slipworld.”
Hester rounded one corner, then the next, her eyes searching frantically for the middle step that marked the entrance to the Slipworld. Finally, she spotted it. Gathering up every last bit of energy, Hester dived at the wall. But before she could reach the plaster, she was suddenly jerked backwards and a streak of pain tore across her back. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that Demarge’s black-glove was clenched around a fistful of flight-feathers he’d ripped from her tail. Without her feathers for steerage, she had no balance and very little hope of making a clean entrance into the Slipworld.
A thud vibrated through Hester’s body as she slammed into the wall. She scrambled desperately, pecking for the seam that would let her to slip home. Demarge lunged, his fingers reaching out for her like claws. The little sparrow swerved as the glove missed her by millimetres, her toenail snaring a hole in the wall. Before she knew it, she was plummeting headlong into the rubbery darkness. Demarge beat the wall with his fist as the bird disappeared before his eyes.
“Damn you,” he swore under his breath.
***
Daden was already in the Valley of Flowers when Hester came barrelling back through the seam. She crash-landed among the flowers, rolling several times before coming to a stop at his feet. He bent down and picked her up, cradling her in the palm of his large hand.
“Poor bird, you look like you’ve just fought a war,” he muttered, gently touching the sparrow’s burnt wing and the raw skin where her tail feathers had been.
Hester flinched. Slowly, a soft, red glow began to spread down the length of Daden’s fingertips and seep into the bird’s body. Within seconds, new feathers were sprouting. Hester glanced up at Daden and chirped gratefully. He smiled and turned to the woman standing next to him. She was tall and thin, with long hair that was so blonde it was almost silver.
“We aren’t going to be able to hold the protective shield up for much longer,” he said. “It’s only a matter of time before the light loses its strength and is no longer able to resist Demarge.” The woman nodded ruefully.
“We need Saba and Shuride here immediately.” She turned to the mountains behind them and cupped her hands to her mouth, uttering a cry that echoed across the valley, before turning her attention to Hester.
“So, small bird, what news do you bring of our brother and sister?”
The sparrow raised her head and began chirping excitedly. Daden stopped her when she reached the part about the light compass and the discovery that there were three more Shards in danger than the two they’d originally known about.
“One of them has to be Clare,” he said, “but the other two?” Daden exchanged worried glances with the woman. “This greatly complicates things. I’m not sure how many Shards we’ll be able to get back, especially if Min and Thomas are weak.”
“We can’t worry about that now,” said the woman. “The main thing is to get back and find them. I think you should probably go to the mine and I’ll look for Clare and the others separately.”
Daden nodded slowly. “It’s dangerous, separating our strength like that, but I can see your point Freya, we don’t really have a choice.”
Sensing something behind her, Freya turned to see two black dots approaching rapidly over the tops of the mountains. As they drew closer, the dots morphed into people, flying at breakneck speed towards the Valley. They gradually began to drop lower and lower, until they were hovering just above Freya and Daden. A man landed first, then a woman, her long, black hair trailing behind her like ribbons. Freya smiled.
“Saba, Shuride, thank you for coming so quickly.”
“I presume it’s Demarge?” said the man, looking anxiously from Freya to Daden.
He was shorter than either of them, with closely cropped, straight black hair, light-olive skin and narrow eyes.
“I’m afraid so, Saba,” said Freya. “He’s come very close to finding the entrance and it is now just a matter of time before he does. Daden and I have to go into the world of matter to rescue Min, Thomas and a group of Shards. We will need you to guard the entrance while we’re gone.”
“How about the Shards in the outer regions?” said Shuride.
“Gather them at the farmhouse, but come back here as soon as you can. Saba will need all the help he can get if Demarge finds his way through the seam,” said Freya.
Shuride nodded and was soon airborne again, her hair streaming behind her as she headed towards the mountains. Daden put his hand on Saba’s shoulder.
“We’ll be back as soon as we can. If the Shards ask questions, just try to keep them calm.”
Saba nodded as Daden stepped through the seam and disappeared. Freya was next. She reached out,
felt for the seam, and stepped soundlessly onto the middle step of the stairwell. To her surprise she was immediately confronted by the wall of Daden’s back. He was standing perfectly still.
“Daden?” she said, putting her hand gently on his arm and peering around him. It was then that she realised why he hadn’t moved.
Demarge was standing on the lower stairs, leaning against the wall as casually as someone might lean against a bus shelter. He leered at them triumphantly, a snide smile playing at the corners of his mouth as his eyes glinted dangerously in the gloomy half light. He tilted his head and raised his right eyebrow, looking the Aeons up and down disapprovingly.
“Good to see you both,” he said. “Such an unexpected honour, playing host to Aeons of your standing. I hope you get a chance to see the local tungsten mine. It’s glorious at this time of year.” He stepped towards them.
“Stay where you are,” Daden warned.
“That’s hardly manners, is it? Especially when you’re my visitors.” Demarge took another step forward.
“I mean it,” said Daden. “Stay where you are.”
Demarge ignored him. There were now just two stairs separating them.
“And what if I don’t want to stay where I am? What do you think you’re going to do?”
Freya stepped out from behind Daden and onto the stair immediately below him. She was now nose to nose with Demarge.
“We’ve come to take what’s ours, Demarge.”
“What’s yours?” Demarge snorted. “Surely you haven’t forgotten, Freya? Mortals belong to me.”
“Back off, Demarge,” said Daden.
There was a leaden pause and for a couple of seconds nothing moved. Not even a breath. Suddenly, Demarge clenched his fist and twisted his wrist sharply. Neither Aeon had time to react before Daden went flying backwards, his body slamming against the wall of the stairwell. He hung limply from his collar, his hand clutched around his throat in pain. Freya leapt up the stairs towards him.
“Let him go!” she screamed.