by Logan Joss
‘I need to get in there,’ Trevor said, pointing through the gate.
With a swift movement, the man produced a ledger from beneath his arm and started to riffle through it. ‘Which vessel?’
Trevor hesitated. ‘I’m not from a vessel. But I need to get to that one,’ he said, pointing to the Harpy’s Song.
The man clapped his ledger shut and slid it back under his arm with a look of disdain. ‘If you’re not affiliated with a vessel, you have no business here. Now clear off.’ He wafted him away with a flick of his hands.
‘But you don’t understand. I need to get to that vessel.’
‘And you need to understand that if you don’t clear off I will call the authorities and have you removed.’
Seeing the look on the man’s face, Trevor backed off reluctantly, glancing between him and the vessel. As he walked past the Harpy’s Song, he could see no signs of life upon it. Mèlli’s probably long gone anyway, he thought, realizing he was no closer to finding his friend than he had been before.
Feeling downhearted, he followed the railings towards the end of the harbordrome, where it turned into a wall and led back up to the main thoroughfare.
‘Excuse me. Do you know where I can find a man called Sklõff?’ In an act of desperation, he asked the first person he came to, but she carried on walking, not even acknowledging his existence.
He turned immediately and asked someone else, but again he was ignored.
The third person looked him up and down and grimaced with disgust before walking away.
Trevor stopped, his eyes welling with tears. ‘Please! Will someone just help me!’ he wailed. But the crowd just parted and flowed around him in a sea of indifference.
Dejectedly, he plodded along the street, his feet dragging heavily and tears flowing unrestrained down his face. All hope had vanished from him. He had no idea where to turn next. He wished desperately that Ormostrious or Burtlùs or Freya were there with him. But most of all, he wished Mèlli were here. He missed her.
He was halfway along a bridge before he realized where he was. Only the shriek of a large brightly colored bird drew him out of his melancholia. Despite himself, he gasped in wonder and made his way to the edge, holding on tightly to the guardrail as he peered over. The view was astounding. He was on a suspension bridge that spanned the wide chasm between the harbordrome district and the mainland. From this viewpoint he could see that the harbordrome and all the grand buildings surrounding it were on an island—a towering column with sheer cliffs—overlooking the rest of Aÿena, which swept around it in a crescent. Looking towards the city itself, Trevor saw a huge buttress of rock protruding outwards from its center levels, topped by a vast, flat platform alive with a rainbow mosaic of colors that looked like a bazaar. Faced by this huge city before him, he felt daunted at the prospect of trying to find Mèlli. How could he find just one person in amongst this city of thousands?
No! Mèlli needs me. She’s alive, I know she is. And I’m the only person who can save her, Trevor told himself. With renewed purpose, he hurried across the bridge, eager to reach the city and came out onto a wide road that swept down towards Aÿena. He followed a set of lines, carved into the cobbles over centuries of use by carts laden with goods bound for the harbordrome. Part way down the hill, the road split into three, leading to the upper, middle and lower tiers of the city. Trevor chose the left fork and followed it all the way down to a rocky shore.
The air was chill down here as the whole of the lower tier still lay within the shadow of the harbordrome island, but even at this time of the morning, the shoreline was teeming with activity. Weather-worn fishermen with dark, leathery skin and tattoos across their bare chests, went about their daily business, stacking empty lobster pots, repairing nets and hauling in their catch from small boats. Trevor walked awkwardly along the pebbly beach, careful not to stand on the nets and fishing gear, and didn’t notice that he had walked into a chain of men passing crates of fresh fish up onto the shore. One of them turned to Trevor and passed a crate into his hands absentmindedly. Trevor took it without thinking, but it was far heavier than he expected and he stumbled, spilling some of the fish onto the ground.
‘Oi! What d’ya think ya doin’?’ the man barked angrily.
‘Sorry,’ Trevor mumbled, letting go of the box and backing away.
A short distance along the shore, he noticed a set of stone steps and made a hasty retreat towards them. The long, narrow flight of steps led steeply upwards and brought him out onto a sub-tier below the bazaar, where his ears were assaulted by a cacophony of voices as vendors bartered over crates of fish and other harvests of the sea. Suddenly a movement overhead drew Trevor’s attention away from the voices, as a small wooden tender-like vessel floated by soundlessly and docked at the level above. He hurried on up another set of steps, eager to get a closer look, and watched as the cargo was unloaded—rolls of fine fabrics, spices and other rare goods from all over Ëlamár, brought down from the merchant galleons moored in the harbordrome. Men with barrowcarts and urgent faces waited nearby, ready to whisk the goods off to be sold. Trevor watched as they filled their carts and darted skillfully between the ever-growing crowds of early morning shoppers and into the belly of the bazaar.
He looked around him at the brightly colored yurts and stalls stacked full of exotic wares and felt another pang of loss wash over him as he remembered his last visit to a bazaar. In rus. With Mèlli. But he couldn’t let his emotions overcome him now. He took a deep breath and strode on in, determined to find someone who could help him.
‘Uh, excuse me, do you know where I can find a Mr Sklõff?’ Trevor asked the first friendly looking face he saw, but the man ignored him and continued shopping.
Undeterred, he asked a woman who had stopped to tend to her young children. ‘Excuse me, I’m looking for a Mr Sklõff. Do you know him?’
The woman pulled her children away from him protectively. ‘Get away, you filthy urchin!’
‘I don’t mean you any harm. I just need to find this man Sklõff.’
But the woman stepped in front of her children, her face full of contempt. ‘I told you. Get away from us.’
Her raised voice drew the attention of some nearby men who turned and gave Trevor a threatening look. ‘Is this wretch bothering you?’ one of them asked.
‘He means to rob me, or worse.’
‘Come on, get out of here!’ the men said, stepping towards him with their arms raised.
Without a second thought, Trevor turned and forced his way through the throng of people until he was out of their sight. His heart was pounding and his legs were trembling with fear—he had no idea why everyone was treating him like this and he wanted to escape from these hostile crowds. He saw his opportunity and slipped into a quiet yurt, where he paused with his hands on his knees to try and steady his nerves. It wasn’t until he stood up that he realized what a mess he looked. He caught sight of his reflection in a mirror and he was shocked by what he saw. His clothes were ripped and stained with blood and his hair was matted. No wonder, he thought with a chuckle. I look like a scarecrow!
‘Can I help you?’ came a voice from behind him.
Trevor turned around to see the thin, elderly yurt owner peering at him over the top of his spectacles. ‘Yes. Actually, you can help me,’ he said with determination. ‘I’m looking for Mr Sklõff.’
The man raised his eyebrows. ‘I don’t know anyone called Sklõff. But your kind will all be over in the merchant quarter. Try The Wayfarer’s Bounty,’ he said, waving Trevor off with a flick of his hand.
‘Thank you, sir,’ Trevor said as he scurried off. He had no idea where the merchant’s quarter was but continued walking in the direction the store holder had indicated.
After a while, he began to think he was lost as he’d been weaving his way in and out of countless avenues of yurts that looked the same in every direction. This bazaar is huge, he thought. It was far bigger than the one in rus and could have swallowe
d that little city whole.
Trevor could smell the merchant’s quarter before he could see it. The aromas of roasted meats and strong ale drifted between the yurts to his nostrils and made him realize how hungry he was. He hadn’t eaten anything since waking that morning in the forest with Selmás and was looking forward to satisfying his hunger. But when he emerged into the square beyond the bazaar, it was not what he had hoped for. The area was filled with rough-looking merchant types with scarred, grizzled faces and toothless grins, who stood in tight knots drinking tankards of mead and eating ripe meat off the bone. To one side of the square was a kiosk, where a vendor roasted the carcasses of small animals on a spit. Trevor approached cautiously and stood close by, his mouth watering as he watched the juices drip from the meat and sizzle on the hot coals below.
‘You need to pay before you order,’ the vendor grunted.
Trevor patted his pockets as if this act alone would fill them with coins. But he knew that he had none. In fact, he didn’t even know what passed for money on Ëlamár. With a sigh, he walked away.
As he made his way along the street past the intimidating groups of men, the hairs on the back of his head stood up as he remembered the evening on the quayside in rus, and he felt that he should give these merchants as wide a berth as possible. He hurried along with his head down, trying to avoid eye contact, but his attention was drawn by the pained squealing of an animal. He looked up. A crowd had gathered in the middle of the street and they were all watching something and whooping enthusiastically. Against his better judgment, he edged closer and stood on tiptoe to peer over the men’s broad shoulders. To his horror, he saw two featherless birds tearing at each other’s flesh as the men cheered on their favorite. The birds’ skin looked more like a lizard’s—their only feathers were in a black crest on their heads— and their wings had been broken off and ended in bloodied stumps. Trevor turned away as quickly as he could, feeling sick at the sight of such cruelty.
It was with huge relief that he saw, further down the street ahead of him, a sign above a door that read: The Wayfarer’s Bounty. Finally, he could feel his search coming to an end and he quickened his pace to get there as soon as possible. But before he had taken more than a few steps, the door to a nearby tavern burst open and drunken men poured out into the street, blocking his path.
‘You’ll wish ya kept my dear old mother outta this by the time I’ve finished with ya,’ one man yelled.
‘I’d be more worried if it were her I were fightin’,’ another said.
The crowd encircled the men, goading them as they launched at each other.
Trevor stopped in his tracks. His first thought was to wait it out until the fight had ended, but the crowd was growing as men from other taverns came out to join them and he felt like he needed to get away as soon as possible. With gritted teeth, he edged around the crowd and hurtled towards The Wayfarer’s Bounty, closing the door behind him. As he stood there, pressed up against the back of the door, he looked up and saw that everyone in the room was staring at him with a malicious grin.
‘Looks like your new barmaid’s arrived, Nelgùs,’ one man said loudly, pointing towards Trevor. This was met with rapturous laughter.
‘I hope she lasts longer than the last one,’ said another.
‘Not likely, have you seen the state of it,’ said a third.
The landlord, Nelgùs, ignored the comments from his customers and shouted across to Trevor, ‘Clear off! No begging in here.’
‘I’m not a beggar,’ Trevor said in a small voice. ‘I’m looking for Mr Sklõff. Do you know where I can find him?’
‘And who might be asking?’ Nelgùs said through narrowed eyes.
‘Just another urk with delusions of grandeur,’ a man interjected to a roar of laughter.
‘How many is that this moon?’
‘Dunno. Lost count.’
‘Didn’t know you could count.’
Trevor just stood there feeling dazed as the drunken banter continued around him. Then, from a shadowy corner at the far end of the tavern, came the harsh sound of metal on wood and the room fell into silence.
‘Leave the boy be!’ a voice boomed from beneath a hooded cloak. ‘You will find Sklõff in his villa, upon the top tier. Look for the golden gates. But be warned, boy, Sklõff is not a man to be trifled with.’
‘Uh, thank you, sir,’ Trevor said and hurried out.
‘Well, we’ll never see him again,’ a man said as the door banged shut behind him.
Trevor didn’t stop running until he was out of the merchant’s quarter and back in the safety of the bazaar. He could see the upper tiers looming above him, each one towering over the buildings on the level below. He noticed that people were making their way between each tier via ramps or steps and the top two tiers were also connected to the rest of the city by barges, which hovered gracefully at jetties while people alighted and others boarded. Thinking that the flying barges would be the quickest way to reach the top tier, Trevor made his way towards the nearest jetty, keeping to the fringe of the bazaar so as not to be slowed by the milling crowds of shoppers, and joined the line of people waiting to board the next barge. He jiggled impatiently as it seemed that the people before him were in no rush to climb aboard. They took their seats at a leisurely pace, talking amongst themselves as they did so. Eventually, he made it to the front of the line only to be met by an arm, barring his way.
‘Pass, please,’ the conductor said.
‘Oh, I haven’t got one.’
‘Then you’ll have to walk.’ The conductor pointed over in the direction of a ramp.
Trevor felt deflated by this latest blow to his progress and trudged off sulkily to begin the long climb to the top tier.
Each of the levels he passed through seemed to have its own character. As he ascended, the houses became cleaner and better kept and there were elegant parks and gardens filled with bright, fragrant flowers. The sun was high in the sky now and reflected off the white buildings giving the upper levels an illuminating glow.
He walked through a park, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his back and watching the people sauntering about with not a care in the world. The inhabitants of these levels seemed very different from the people he encountered down at the shore. Both men and women were dressed in flowing fabrics with bold, floral prints, which Trevor thought must be the fashion amongst the rich here. He watched in amusement as some of them walked their unusual pets—one of them looked like a miniature feathered wallaby while another looked just like a dog, except for the fact that it had six legs. Ooh, it’s got six legs, Trevor heard Mèlli’s voice say in his head. He smiled fondly, longing to be teased by her again.
From the end of the park, the final ramp wound upwards to the top tier. As he walked up, Trevor felt butterflies in the pit of his stomach as he saw the golden gates of Sklõff’s villa rising above the crest of the hill ahead of him.
32
Fortune Has Many Faces
A HIGH WHITEWASHED wall surrounded Sklõff’s villa, making it difficult for Trevor to see what was going on inside. Beyond the golden bars of the gate, a long driveway swept its way to the front of a building with clean lines and shuttered windows, which was partially obscured on either side by carefully sculpted trees. There were definite signs of life within the villa—Trevor could see movements through some of the open windows and there was a gardener pruning flowers in one of the beds nearby. So climbing over the front gate was out of the question.
He decided to scout the perimeter and followed the wall around to the side, where a narrow access road led to the rear of the property. There was another gate here, still lavish in design but smaller than the one at the front, which led into a courtyard between the villa and a smaller outbuilding. To get a view of what lay beyond the wall, Trevor climbed up the gate and looked around. There was no sign of anyone back here. The courtyard was quiet and empty. This was his chance to sneak in unnoticed, he thought, and climbed higher up the gate, tryi
ng to make as little noise as possible. But just as he reached the top, the clattering sound of wooden wheels over cobblestones came from behind him and he froze rigid.
A cart, pulled by a small boodaloofe, was making its way up the road towards him. In a panic and not wanting to be caught, he scrambled back down the gate as quickly as he could, catching his foot on a latch in his haste and landing in a heap on the ground. The gate swung open with a slow creak. Trevor pulled himself up and tried not to look suspicious as the cart came to a stop right beside him. Before he had time to gather his thoughts, the driver had hopped down and grabbed a crate of fresh fish from the back.
‘Well come on then boy, grab a box. I haven’t got all the time in Ëlamár,’ he barked at Trevor.
Trevor thought for a moment. This was much better than his plan of just sneaking in. He did as he was told and took another box from the back of the cart, then followed the fishmonger into the grounds of the villa, keeping his head down and glancing around self-consciously, hoping that no-one would notice him. They were heading towards the open door of the kitchens.
‘Morning, Pöhlan. Got a beautiful catch for you today,’ the fishmonger shouted as he walked in. He put the crate down on the floor before heading back out to the cart for the next one. Trevor did the same, careful not to make eye contact with anyone inside.
On their second trip, a woman dressed in servants clothes had come to stand outside the door. ‘I haven’t seen you before,’ she said to Trevor with an expectant smile.
‘Oh, um, I’m new,’ he muttered in response as he stepped into the scullery.
The woman turned to the fishmonger. ‘So who’s the—’
‘Sorry, no time to stick around today, Pöhlan. Too many deliveries to make.’ He nodded his goodbyes and strode back to the cart. Pöhlan stood at the door and watched until he closed the gate behind him.
Trevor knew that he didn’t have long. He had to get out of sight before she could question him, so he headed out of the kitchens at a brisk trot and into a corridor. No sooner had he turned a corner than he came out at the bottom of a flight of stairs, face to face with a portly woman carrying a bundle of dirty linen down towards him. He stopped dead in his tracks, not knowing where to run and expecting her to cry out an alarm. But she didn’t. She looked at him kindly and raised a finger to her lips.