by G. P. Taylor
“It comes to me,” the boy said unexpectedly, taking Solomon by complete surprise. “Let us both go free or I will tell the Wretchkin of what you have done and ask it to rip out your throat.”
Campion looked about him, listening for the creature above the pinnacle. Solomon saw his panic and laughed heartily.
“Touch the girl and I will kill you myself,” Tersias added.
“I think, Campion, that the boy has lost his heart to our latest disciple. Such is the power of love. But in this case it will never conquer all.” Solomon rolled back the sleeves of his coat and untied the purple scarf from around his neck, folding it neatly and placing it in his pocket. “Love—such a strange thing. I remember once, as a child, loving a dog. Whatever I did to it, no matter how cruel I could be, the creature never remembered my transgressions. Unconditional, all-forgiving love—fit for dogs.” Solomon looked at Campion. “Make ready, my friend. If the creature that visits us causes any harm, kill the boy. His death will send the beast away and it will harm us no more.”
It was then that the Wretchkin slipped silently into the room. For several moments there was complete quiet as it looked closely at Solomon, staring into his eyes and examining every inch of his frame. The creature stroked his face and Solomon, feeling the touch like a light breeze, shivered.
“Is it here, boy?” he asked Tersias anxiously, stepping back to the crystal.
“I am everywhere,” the Wretchkin replied suddenly through the boy, the sound of his voice altered to that of the creature. “You are a brave man, playing with my oracle. Either that or a fool.”
“I am neither fool nor braggadocio. All I want from you is to know my future. Tell me and the boy can go free.” Solomon’s eyes flickered one way then the next, hoping to catch a glimpse of the creature. “That is not much to ask, is it?”
“It is more than many men would ever dare to think. Why are you so obsessed with your future? Is there no contentment with the life you have?” Tersias convulsed as the words of the Wretchkin shuddered through his mouth. “For the past three thousand years I have come to the likes of you and shown them the way. Your kind is the worst. Tell the world you are the saviour, trick them into following you, and when what you said was the truth doesn’t come to pass, you’ll slope off and hide or poison your disciples. You’ll tell them that the only way to get to the Promised Land is by dying to this life. Is that the truth?”
“It was something that had crossed my mind. Only you can tell me what is to come.” Solomon clutched the glass shard in his hand, his heart telling him to end the boy’s life and dispatch the creature back to the darkness.
“That is a wicked thought, Solomon,” the creature said as it prowled around him and pinched his ear with its thick claws. “Do not even think of harming the boy. I have not done with him yet.”
“Then tell me what I need to know and I will be done with him,” Solomon snapped at the Wretchkin, angry that his thoughts should be so transparent.
“Listen and this will be done.” The creature spoke slowly through Tersias. “Never blind the boy again with your talismans. I will speak to him when I want. Nor imprison him where he cannot be found.” The Wretchkin paused, as his consideration was drawn to the crystal and the locust that had now begun to feast upon its own legs, hanging to the glass by the slightest barb.
The silence of the creature drove Solomon to distraction. “Do you still stay with us?” he asked, his voice fraught with panic. “Whatever you want, I will do. Please, tell me what is to come . . .”
The Wretchkin laughed, his mirth apparent on the lips of the boy. “So mote it be, Solomon. From your mind I gather that your concern is for your plans and what will happen when you release the locusts.” Tersias whispered the words now. “The way for you is not as you desire. Tell Lord Malpas you have the boy, he, too, searches for him. Malpas would wish to be Emperor, to lead a revolution and do away with the King. In him you will have a companion for your quest. Do this and all you could ever imagine would be yours.” The Wretchkin stalked across the room and stood over the interlaced wands of yew that formed the wicker coffin. “Find the friend of the girl and you will also find what Malpas searches for. Her companion has a knife and an alabaster box that he stole from Malpas. It is vital that these are found soon. In that I will have my desire.”
XVI
FOSCARI
In the royal dungeon in Fleet Prison, Jonah awakened from the long sleep that had held him throughout the day. He wiped the grit from his eyes with the back of his hand and studied the fading red embers of the fire.
Malachi slept on, his head nodding back and forth, his lips quivering with each and every breath as if uttering a silent curse. Night was here, soon it would be time to leave the dungeon far behind and escape. Pulling up the collar of his coat and wrapping the wide lapels tightly around himself, Jonah huddled closer to the flames and looked up the cavernous, black chimney. High above he could hear the chiming of a distant bell. Five long carillons and then silence as a cold gust blew down a fall of black soot. It fell upon the glimmers of fire like black snow.
Jonah took a deep breath, the smell of the soot filling his head with thoughts of childhood. He remembered the chimney boy with his badger brush and harsh cough that would echo down the smokestack and into his room. The boy’s master would shout Climb higher, brush faster, as showers of black dust fell in thick clumps. That master would become his after Jonah’s father was poisoned.
Malachi stirred, the cold creeping through his feet. He opened one eye and stared at Jonah. “Still here?” he said, his teeth chattering. “Thought you would be long gone by now, leaving old Malachi to fend for himself and dangle alone.”
Jonah took hold of the old man by his fingers and wrapped them in his palms to warm them through. “Promised I would stay and that together we would leave.” He blew a soft warm breath upon his hands. “I said we would escape and together we will. I have a plan. When they come for us, it will be as if we have vanished without a trace.”
“Then we better be quick, I don’t think Skullet will leave us here for long without having someone check upon us. Ghosts or not, they’ll be down and have us manacled before night is out.”
“We better be on our way then,” Jonah said, and he got up from the hearth and began to stack the broken beams of the table against the back of the deep fireplace, far enough from the embers so they would not catch alight. Malachi watched as Jonah busied himself back and forth, pulling long beams of old dried wood and breaking them in half. One by one he interwove them, stacking the planks higher and higher.
“Should I ask what you are doing?” Malachi enquired as he got to his feet and painfully stretched out his arms towards the ceiling.
“No,” replied the boy.
“Are you going to burn down the prison and we walk from the ashes like a pair of fat phoenix?”
“No.” Jonah was lost in what he was doing.
“Then we are to tunnel from this place and what you are preparing is a celebratory fire?”
“No.” He smiled. “But soon you will see for yourself.” Jonah busied himself stacking the wood against the sidewalls of the fireplace, linking them together to form a wooden web. “Tonight, Malachi, we will make our escape through the roof and emerge into the city.”
“Climb? Do you expect me to climb?” Malachi asked incredulously as he looked at his frail, worn hands.
“If you could fly, then that would be an option. We have but one way and that is through the chimney, onto the roof, across to the wall and then into the night. Skullet won’t find us and we will be free.”
“I can’t . . . ,” Malachi said as he turned quickly from him.
“You can’t give up before you try,” Jonah snapped. “I am but a lad and the thought of having my neck stretched is not one I wish to entertain. You can come with me and together we can escape. I can’t leave you.” Jonah grabbed the man by his coat and pulled him back. “What would you do, stay here and die?”
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“You don’t understand. Any other way and I would join you, but this—it is too much to ask.”
“There is no other way. Do you have some magic to melt the stone, a spell to soften the locks and dazzle the guards? Speak, Malachi, or else follow me,” Jonah shouted. “ ’Tis an easy climb, every chimney is made that way. It’ll be like climbing the steps to the cathedral and any old hag can do that.”
“It is not the climb, but the cavern itself. The blackness, the pressing of the stones, the narrowness of the tunnel. It is these things I fear—more than hanging from the end of the rope.”
Jonah laughed, his face exploding in a bright smile. “You would rather die than go into the dark?” he asked as he picked a broken table leg from the floor. “I’ll be your light, a step ahead all the way. I’ll keep the stones from falling upon you.”
“It’s not just the darkness, it is the enormity of the height,” Malachi said. “I am glad to say that my feet have never left the ground, not even a jump or hop would I ever make for fear of the height to which I could be taken.”
“Then I go alone,” Jonah said as he stepped into the fireplace among the smouldering coals and peered up the chimney.
“You’ll burn, boy,” Malachi shouted as he scurried across the room. “The walls will be red hot.”
“Where you and I are destined to end up will be even hotter,” the boy shouted as he wrapped the cuffs of his coat around his hands and looked up to grasp the first stone he could reach. The wound to his arm gave a sudden sharp bite that sweated his brow. “Come on, Malachi, follow me and we shall escape this place and Skullet. If not for me, for Tersias. I know your heart misses him and I fear he will need you more now that he has fallen into the hands of Solomon.”
Malachi looked about him, looking for something to show him the future. In his excitement he shuffled from one foot to the other, his mind torn apart by his fear of the chimney and his resignation to the hangman’s rope. “Jonah, don’t leave an old man in this misery,” he whimpered.
“Then follow me and I will help you climb. I promise your feet will be on solid rock, there are more steps here than in the Tower of London.” Jonah gripped on to the first stone and pulled himself from the ground. The stone seared his grip like a hot loaf picked from the oven. He climbed quickly and in several steps found the first ledge, where it was cooler. It was crammed with decades of thick black soot that swirled around him as he got to his feet and looked back down the chimney.
There, peering back at him like a large bearded owl, was Malachi. “Where is my first footing?” he whispered.
“Higher, Malachi, and to your right. Look how they are set in the wall, ready for you to climb.”
Malachi looked up. In the glimmer was a stairway to heaven made of stones projecting from the wall and spiralling the chimney. He could make out the ghostlike darkened figure of Jonah, now edged in the black soot that whirled about him in the up-draught. “Pray for me, boy. My throat is already burning like these coals and my heart beats so loudly, I am deaf to the world.”
Malachi picked his way to the first ledge as Jonah pressed on above him. The steps got wider as they climbed, each the width of a double span. Flat stones three inches thick and set deeply into the walls. Soon his beard was coated in thick black soot. As he climbed, he kept his eyes tightly shut, groping for every stone and telling himself he had nothing to fear. He muttered as he went higher, trying to remember the words of some old spell to protect himself.
From high above, the whispering of Jonah urged him onwards. Malachi looked up and opened his eyes. In the darkness he could see the glow of a faint light that emanated from the wall of the chimney. Jonah had stopped, and he gestured for Malachi to be silent. The magician pulled himself onto the ledge where Jonah stood, looking through the back slat of an empty fireplace. His soot-blackened face was lit by the dim light that came through the narrow chimney flue. The sound of men talking in a room, their voices competing with one another to be heard, filled the smokestack. One scornful voice cut above the others, piercing the darkness and setting Jonah’s mind on edge.
“Militia,” Jonah whispered into Malachi’s ear. “We are at the level of the ground.”
“Hear that?” said an anxious voice from the room.
“What?” asked another.
“Whispering, right beside me, as if someone was speaking in my ear.”
“What did they say?” another said scornfully. The sound of a metal tankard being thrown across the room echoed into the chimney. “You’ve drunk too much, you’ll be telling us that you can see the ghost of that drummer-boy young Ketch was on about.”
“I tell you I heard something whispering. You’re not getting me down in those dungeons again—you’ll all go together, but not me. It’s me he’s after.”
Suddenly the man stopped speaking as a door was flung open, smashing loudly against the wall. Jonah and Malachi heard from within the room the sound of Skullet’s voice.
“Captain!” he shouted loudly, his voice muffled by the fire-back to a loud grunt. “Take your men and bring the prisoners to the yard, they are to be taken to Vamana House. Lord Malpas has prepared a trial for midnight in the Great Hall. Judge Dobson has been dragged from his dotage—he is a gentleman more willing to judge the hearts of others than himself. Even the creator has more pity on a bad soul than the Honourable Dobson,” Skullet scoffed loudly. “When he finds them guilty . . . they are to be executed in the morning.”
There was then the sound of the door slamming and several men pushing over wooden chairs and running from the room. As they ran, they clattered their sabres, frantically fighting with one another so as not to be the one left behind.
“They are coming for us and soon will find that we are gone,” Malachi said. “The militia will know the only way out is to the roof, and then they will catch us again and have done with us.” He gripped the stones above the ledge, steadying himself as he looked down to the dim glow.
Jonah didn’t reply as he pulled at a stone above his head. It came away in a great cloud of black dust and cobwebs, and with one hand Jonah threw it down the shaft to the smouldering ashes below. It crashed against the neatly intertwined stack of wood that Jonah had patiently built around the walls of the chimney. There was a clattering of broken boards as one by one the pieces of wood fell into the centre of the fire. This pile of tinder-dry firewood quickly burst into flames, the bright light illuminating the heights of the chimney and sending blasts of hot smoke towards them.
“The fire will keep them off our track for some time,” Jonah said. In the half-light he beckoned Malachi to follow him higher. “Keep climbing behind me, quickly. Our only hope is to get to the top before we dry like kippers.”
“I hope . . . you know . . . what you are doing, Jonah.” Malachi coughed out the words. The smoke began to sting his sore eyeballs. “I don’t think I can go on.”
“Look to the stars,” Jonah shouted. “There you will have your freedom.”
“I have looked to the stars all my life and they have been like lying wives, never telling me the truth and squandering all I have. What good will they do me now?” Malachi asked as a billow of sulphurous fumes engulfed them both in thick blue smoke.
Within a minute they had reached a large ledge that stuck out from two sides of the chimney to form a small balcony. It was littered with the dried carcasses of long-dead crows and illuminated by the starlight that flooded through the four chimney stacks above their heads.
“Three feet and we’ll be free!” Jonah said, his words echoing in the fireplace below just as Skullet and the militia burst into the room.
“Find them!” shouted Skullet. His command billowed upwards with the flames and smoke as his men scoured the dungeon for any sign of the foscari. “They cannot be far, Mrs. Devereaux told me that no one could ever escape from here. We are below ground, there is no way out . . .” It was then that he saw the blazing fire, and a sudden realisation of their escape spun through his min
d. “Spring-heeled Jack!” he said to himself as he ran across the room. “They’ve escaped up the chimney. . . . You, stay here,” he said, pointing to the captain of the guard. “The rest of you, up to the roof. There’ll be hell to pay if either one of them gets free, and mark my words, one of you will take their place on the gallows if they escape. Quickly . . .”
Jonah scrambled from the balcony up to the chimney pot. He held his breath, grappled his way through the opening and squeezed himself out of the smokestack. Far below he could see the militia running around the courtyard of the prison, looking for a way to the roof. The noise of their escape had woken Mrs. Devereaux, who bustled about the prison gate, looking up at Jonah and shouting curses.
Wildly, Jonah pulled at the chimney pot, hoping to pull it from its base, knowing that Malachi would never be able to escape through it. The powder-dry cement broke free and the thick, hard-baked terra-cotta shattered into splinters that scuttled over the tiled roof and cascaded to the courtyard below, showering the militia with shards of red pot.
Their screams echoed out from the prison and into the city. Mrs. Devereaux fulfilled her duty as jailer by frantically swinging from the prison bell to warn the world of the escape. Jonah laughed as she dangled from the rope like a fat pigeon hung by its feet.
As the choking sounds of Malachi came from deep inside a thick cloud of smoke that swelled up from within the stack, Jonah grabbed another chimney pot, then another, tearing them with his bare hands from the capping stones. One by one he threw the terra-cotta pots to the ground far below, where the militia were setting up ladders to scale the rooftop.
With one hand he reached in to Malachi. “Quickly, take my hand and I will pull you free,” he said. He tried to drag more debris from the capping stones to make the hole bigger for the magician. “If only your spirits would raise you through the roof and hear your spell.”
“I fear I have been talking to myself.” Malachi coughed as he took Jonah’s hand and heaved himself upwards towards the starlight.